Untangled Roots
by ICanStopAnytime
Summary: After Ezekiel's death, Daryl takes Carol on a road trip to uncover her family roots in Jamestown. What they discover is far more compelling than any family history...
1. Chapter 1

Daryl's awake before the door creaks open. It's the mere sensation of the presence on the other side of the door that awakens him.

Candlelight flickers in the entry way, illuminating the small figure of the little boy. "Uncle Daryl? I had a bad dream."

If Daryl had ever come into his father's room to complain of a bad dream, two things would have happened: first Daryl would have been called a pussy, and second, he would have felt the backside of his father's hand.

"C'mere."

Hershey pads barefoot across the floor and sets the candle on the rustic two-drawer nightstand by Daryl's small bed in the servant's quarters of the Hilltop's historic mansion. Daryl flings back the comforter so Hershey can crawl under it, and then he drapes it over the boy again like the wing of a bird. The boy curls like a kitten on his side, and Daryl doesn't dare blow out the candle, not yet. He'll wait until Hershey's asleep.

"Tell me the story of my parents again," the boy asks.

Daryl settles his head back down on his feather-stuffed pillow, looks up at the cracked ceiling, and sighs. "Yer daddy was the best supply runner in all of Georgia, and yer mama was the farmer's daughter…"

Daryl only gets a tenth of the way through the tale before Hershey's little chest is rising and falling. Careful not to disturb the boy, Daryl puts a hand on the mattress on the other side of him, leans forward, and blows in one cool breath.

The flame flickers out.

On her death bed, Maggie made Daryl promise to protect the boy, and he has. Usually Hershey sleeps in Enid's room, who has become like a young mother to him, but more and more often these days, he pads his way to Daryl's.

In the darkness, Daryl can't help but think of all the people who once made up his tiny tribe in Georgia. They're all gone now, except Michonne and Judith, who live in Alexandria, and Carol, who has been ruling as sole monarch of the Kingdom ever since Ezekiel died last year.

And him. He still lingers on here at the Hilltop, which Jesus runs with Aaron. If Merle had known Daryl would ever subject himself to the rule of a gay couple…well, Daryl can't even imagine what his brother would say.

But Daryl's not really ruled by anyone. He follows the rules of the Hilltop, in so far as he finds them reasonable and they align with his whims anyway. He hunts to feed the growing population, trains young Hershel to one day do the same, and otherwise comes and goes as he pleases. Mostly it pleases him to stay.

Mostly.

But once a month or so he journeys to Alexandria to check up on Michonne and Judith. He recognizes the baby he once held in his arms less and less with each passing month. There's more of Shane in her than of Rick, and only a faint hint of Carl.

And once a week or so he makes a trip to the Kingdom as an ambassador of the Hilltop, dines at Carol's table, and stays the night on the strange couch that rests beneath her bedroom windowsill. She calls it a _chaise lounge_ , but it's not much for lounging on.

Carol's changed. She's come into her own as the queen of the largest community in their known world. He's probably the only thing left that roots her to the Carol she once was, and he wonders sometimes if she wishes he'd stop visiting, just let those old roots unravel, let her move on from the memories that still haunt her dreams.

But he can't. He can't stop visiting, because she was the first person to ever believe in him. The first person to ever _see_ the man he could become. And sometimes he fears that if she doesn't see him…he'll simply vanish.

Daryl closes his eyes and breaths in Hershey's scent. The boy smells of forest leaves and the baked cinnamon apples he had for dessert, and his soft, safe breaths are like a lullaby that sings Daryl back to sleep.

[*]

Daryl bows deeply at his waist, the way he always does when he comes to visit Carol, just to hear her say, "Stop it! Stop it right now!"

"As you please, your highness," he replies as he rises to his not quite full – but slightly slouched – stature. She's smiling _that_ smile, the one she only gives him. Or at least he likes to think so.

The Kingdom seems brighter and bigger every time he comes to visit it, more full of vegetables and animals and children and life. He doesn't know how she does it.

He eats in her private chambers, a converted classroom, at a two-person table in her kitchenette, a meal she's cooked herself. "Don't have a royal chef yet?" he asks, and she says, "Stop it."

The longbow she started using three years ago hangs on the wall beyond the table, and he thinks he'd like to challenge her to an archery competition tomorrow, but he's not sure he'd win. Besides, he's leaving at daybreak, returning to the Hilltop, and this will be his last visit to the Kingdom. He has to let her go, free her from this shadow of the old world, this specter from a past she's moved so far beyond.

He'll tell her in the morning.

But tonight, he eats her food and soaks in her smiles, and curls like a stray dog on her fancy chaise lounge, where he drifts off to sleep beneath a fleece blanket, his boots strewn haphazardly on the faux marble classroom floor, his dirty socks stuffed inside.

He dreams of Rick, vanishing in flames. He dreams of Carl, breathing hard as he sits back against the storm sewer walls. He dreams of Beth, slumping to the floor of the hospital hallway. He dreams of Merle, flesh dangling from his mouth, his eyes glassy and hollow. He dreams of Sophia, lurching out of Hershel's barn.

He awakes with a loud grunt, a cold sweat lining his brow and trickling into the coarse graying hairs of his beard.

"What's wrong?" Carol asks from her bed several feet away.

"I had a bad dream."

"Come here," she says.

Daryl pads barefoot across the cool floor. Carol flings back the quilt so he can crawl under it, and then she drapes it over him again. She draws him toward her, eases his head down on her breasts, and strokes the thick strands of his unruly hair. She bends to kiss head, her lips soft, familiar, and warm.

"This is my last visit," he murmurs in the darkness, but even as he forces the words from his lips, he knows it's a lie.

So does she. "No, Daryl," she replies softly. "It's not."

Daryl breaths in Carol's scent. She smells of rose water and handmade soap, of her leather archery gloves and the mesquite chips she burned to cook tonight's meal. And when he raises his head and dares to kiss her, she tastes of dandelion wine and smoky pork. He pulls away, apologizing, but she draws him back again, urges his head against her chest, and wraps him up in her slender arms.

"Tell me a story," he says.

"Once there was a little broken boy," she begins, "who grew up to be a man…"

He closes his eyes, lets the words wash over him, and slides into sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Daryl sleeps like a baby in Carol's arms and awakes with a sudden panic thudding his heart against its bodily cage. The memory of his lips on hers explodes in his brain. A wave of childish shame washes over him and then breaks and fades like sea foam on the shore when he remembers she didn't rebuff him. As a young child, he was pushed away enough times by his parents that he gave up reaching out for them. But the muscle memory of his rejection is still there, powerful enough that every time he touches Carol, some part of him expects her to shrug him off, even though she never has.

But he's never kissed her before. And now as he drags himself groggily into a sitting position, rubs his eyes, and feels the emptiness of the bed beside him, he wonders what it means that he did, and what it means that she didn't push him away.

He goes looking for her, as the spring birds sing from the young fruit trees in the Kingdom. It's not _looking_ , not really, because he knows where she'll be at this hour, where she's been every morning he's visited.

He stops at the outhouse on his way, and then in the outdoor washing trough, he rubs his hands with hard soap and splashes chilly water on his face. The sounds of the Kingdom waking rise all around him – children laughing or whining on their way to school, the gardeners working among the greens. He gets a few odd looks, some from people who recognize him and nod or wave, and others who don't, look suspicious, but ultimately assume he must be welcome here if he made it through the gates.

He takes his time wending his way down the rocky path beyond the basketball courts, towards the woody patch inside the outer fence, and to the graveyard. He hovers on the outskirts of those graves, waiting quietly.

Carol crouches before Ezekiel's cross, which she wipes down with a rag. Daryl thinks how much better he likes her hair short. She chopped off the long locks in mourning, and then shaved her head completely. For a while, she looked like a cancer patient, but her hair grew quickly. It's just a tiny bit longer than when he first met her, just long enough to make a light, feminine curl behind her ear. She looks so good with her hair like that, so… _classic_. He doesn't know why, exactly, but something about it emphasizes the soft beauty of her face, the subtle turn of her lips, the boldness of her blue eyes. Not that he would ever tell her. She grew it long because she could, because she felt safe with Ezekiel, because the man treated her well.

Daryl never saw much chemistry between the two, but he supposes Carol wasn't looking for passion after so many years on the wrong side of an angry and jealous man. Ezekiel's even keel, so unlike Daryl's own hot flares of feeling, was probably exactly what she needed to root herself and build up the world around her.

But maybe what she needs now is _him_. Maybe he was wrong to think she wants to be rid of the last ghost of her past. Maybe she needs to keep one root there still, in that old quarry camp at the beginning of the end, to remember who she was, and why she became who she became.

Carol rises slowly to a standing position and tucks the rag into the back pocket of her jeans. It hangs over the top, and when she turns, he wants to look at his boots, but instead he freezes, and it's all too clear he's been watching her. A bittersweet smile tugs the corners of her lips as she stroll past the other graves toward him.

Daryl wonders if she visits Ezekiel's grave every morning, or just on the mornings after he visits – a subtle reminder that she doesn't belong to Daryl in that way, even if their roots are old and tangled and knotted together, even if she welcomes him into her room.

"Hey," he mutters, not knowing how to explain his spying presence.

But he doesn't have to. "Hey yourself," she says softly. She jerks her head back toward the king's grave. "I just like to keep it clean."

"Mhmhm." Would she do that for him, if he died? Would she visit his grave and wipe his cross clean? Daryl looks down at his hands, at the dirt and oil deep beneath his fingernails, like a permanent stain, despite all his scrubbing in the trough earlier. It's a ridiculous thought, he thinks, that she would tidy his grave, when she could never tidy him.

"Breakfast?" she asks.

"Could eat."

She begins walking, and he falls in step beside her. He wants to know what that kiss meant, if it bothered her, or if she liked it - if she was just taking pity on him, or if it might happen again someday. He wants to know, but he doesn't dare ask. So instead he asks, "Hell's Henry? Ain't seen 'em since I got here."

"He's at Oceanside. He wants to spend the spring and summer there learning to fish, he says, but I'm pretty sure it has more to do with a girl. I doubt he'll be coming back."

Daryl studies her face for lines of sadness or concern, but she just seems resigned to the fact.

"I guess I'm an empty nester." There's such an aching tone in her voice that it strikes him like a slap across the face that she might be just as lonely as he is – surrounded by community, burdened and privileged with service to their people – and yet still alone.

He stops walking. "Ya a'ight?" he asks.

She's a few steps ahead of him now, so she stops and turns. Her smile is familiar, sad, but not unhappy. It's a distinction Daryl never could have made before this world mingled so much sweet with the bitter. "Gotta be," she says.

"Do ya?"

She sighs and glances around the Kingdom she helped build, this peaceful, vibrant place that has remained free from war for eleven months. "I know I'm in charge. But sometimes, I think…I just want to get away. Get away from it… _all_. Do you know what I mean?"

"Ya askin' _me_?"

She chuckles, and so does he. If anyone should know what that urge feels like, it's him. Daryl stays at the Hilltop most of the time these days, but there are still probably a hundred nights a year he spends alone in the woods, camping while on a hunt.

Carol hugs herself. "Just…leave it all behind for a while. Not forever. Just for a while."

"Hell, then do it. Ya got people who can handle shit. Come to the Hilltop for a bit."

"That's not getting away from it all. Our communities are knit so much more closely together now. And there are too many memories at the Hilltop. Too many graves."

Daryl's eyes flit away from her. He digs in the dirt with his toe. "Road trip?" The words are out before he realizes how ridiculous they sound.

She snorts.

"Yeah. 'S stupid."

Except she stops laughing and he can feel her eyes on him. "Maybe not," she says quietly. "You're right. There are people who can run things here. And there's so much of Virginia we haven't explored. There could still be supplies out there somewhere. Maybe I should just take a horse and cart and…roam."

He looks up from a weed clawing its desperate way through a spot in the earth. "Nah, no ya ain't, not like some kind of Lone Ranger."

She smirks. "Well, unless _you're_ volunteering to be my sidekick – "

"-Just say when, Kemosabe."


	3. Chapter 3

Daryl shoves the lightly crumpled paper into an envelope and hands it to the pony express runner. He needs to let the Hilltop know he'll be gone for a while, but not more than three weeks. Carol needs to be back by mid-May to prepare for the Kingdom's annual trade fair.

He tells him he's taking the Hilltop's horse, the one he rode to the Kingdom. The triumvirate isn't going to be happy about that, and he'll probably hear it when he gets back. He could leave it and tell them to come claim it at the Kingdom, but then he and Carol would have to share a horse, and as much as he misses the days she used to ride with him on his motorcycle, they might need more saddle space to haul discovered supplies.

Carol cinches saddle packs to either side of her black stallion Lancelot and ties a bedroll behind the saddle, and Daryl does the same. The packs are largely empty now, except for a few supplies for the journey, but they hope to fill them completely before they return.

It's afternoon when they finally set out, and the sun is a bright yellow-white light in the strangely cloudless sky. Daryl shields his eyes against the glare as he rides through the open gate behind Carol. He knows she has a plan for this road trip, because she's taken the lead. "Where to, yer Highness?" he asks.

"Don't _call_ me that," she warns, but she's smiling.

Daryl spurs the white spotted mare, which Hershey named Freckles because of the gray-brown splotches that cover its body, forward to draw up fully beside her. He shifts uncomfortably in the saddle. He's become a better rider since the gas spoiled, but he's never fully gotten used to the feel of flesh and blood between his legs. He misses his iron horse something awful. He even misses the smell of the fumes.

Daryl's converted his bike to run on ethanol, and he still rides it a few miles here or there on occasion, when the Hilltop gets a bumper corn crop and lets him take the dregs to make fuel, but he can't make enough to last for long, not even long enough for a journey to the Kingdom. He knows the Hilltop's rulers only indulge his joy riding because they want to keep him happy to keep him around - to keep him helping to fill that smokehouse. "Know ya got someplace in mind. So where we headed? The beach? Virginia wine country?"

Carol's bright blue eyes twinkle. "Do you think we should, Pookie? A romantic getaway at a little B&B at the top of a vineyard?"

"Don't _call_ me that," he warns, but he's smiling, as much as he ever smiles, lips closed, eyes softening lightly.

And, hell, maybe he's blushing a little, too, because his cheeks feel too hot for April, and the taste of her lips still lingers on his, even though it was over twelve hours ago they kissed. Not that he's counting. Not that he cares she hasn't mentioned it, one way or the other.

But…well….it's goddamn confusing, is all.

Usually her flirting is easy to dismiss as a joke. But this afternoon, he's not so sure. What if this trip was a proposal of sorts, and he's just too dense to see it? _Nah._ He'd be more dense to think it was. He wrote that possibility off long ago, the day he saw her kissing Tobin in Alexandria, the day he realized all that flirting with him was _practice_ for other men, which was what he'd suspected all along. He just had to see the evidence before he let the last of the hope die.

And it was just as well. He wouldn't know what to do with a girlfriend. He's figured out what to do with a friend though, and he's pretty damn good at it, too.

Daryl settled, as much as he's capable of settling. He became a friend, an uncle, a provider for the community, and even a source of wisdom – someone for the triumvirate to turn to at times for advice, an idea that would have had Merle in stitches. He's not much more articulate than he was back on the farm, and he's only a little bit cleaner than he was at the prison, but he's a wiser, better man. Carol played her part in that, and he'll never forget how big a part it was.

"Go wherever the hell ya want," he says.

"I was thinking…" she muses as her horse saunters down the road, the sounds of the Kingdom now behind them. "I've always wanted to trace my roots and see where my ancestors lived. You ever have that urge? You know…genealogical research?"

"Hell no. Why would I?"

"You've never wanted to know more about where you came from?"

"Know where I came from. From an asshole daddy and a drunk mama. M'ancestors were likely worse. Probably a bunch of horse thieves." He peers at her. "You wanna go back to Georgia?" He hates to tell her no, but that's just not possible, not if she expects to be back by mid-May, and he won't leave the Hilltop for more than a month. He has to hunt this summer and fall to help stock the smokehouse for the winter.

"My roots aren't in Georgia. My mother's people were from Virginia, going all the way back to colonial Jamestown. Or so she told me."

"So you wanna go to _Jamestown_?"

Carol nods. "I think I do. I want to go to Jamestown and trace my roots."

Daryl snorts. "A'ight, yer majesty. Let's go find yer royal roots."

Carol glowers at him, and he smirks and spurs his horse into a gallop.

The hooves of Carol's horse thunder close behind.


	4. Chapter 4

Grime and dried-up white and black bird shit splatter the faded blue handicap parking sign. Daryl ties his horse to the pole and looks up. "Reminds me of that painting we saw in that office."

"It was a brilliant work of modern art."

"Pfft."

Burger wrappers and napkins drift in the spring breeze like leaves across the nearly abandoned parking lot. A pick-up truck sits with its tailgate open. In its bed, candy toppings that have melted and then refrozen season after season form a putrid dung-like lump inside clear boxes. Someone never finished his looting.

"Dumb Fries," Daryl mutters as Carol pours water in a pan and the horses dip their heads to drink. "What a dumb ass name for a town."

"I think it's pronounced dum–frees."

Daryl peers through the shattered front window of the Dairy Queen and sees no walkers. His thick black boots crunch over the glass on the sidewalk, and he bangs on the glass door with his fist to make sure there's nothing inside. He's about to lean back in a casual waiting position when a walker thuds against the glass door and thrashes its jaw. Daryl leaps in place, and Carol laughs.

He walks sideways away from the door. "Hell he come from?"

"Under one of the booths, I think."

They wait, and soon enough, there's a second one. Daryl loads his crossbow and whistles for the walkers to make their way to the busted-out window. When they do, he shoots them one by one straight in the forehead. He enjoys the target practice – these are the first walkers he's needed to shoot all day. The rest they just rode around.

Daryl swings his bow back on his shoulder. He's just put his hands down on the windowsill and is about to boost himself up to crawl through cut glass when Carol says, "Hey, Kemosabe, did you think to try the door?"

He backs away, turns, and sees her holding the unlocked door wide open. When they walk inside, he goes to recover his first arrow while Carol scoops up two handguns that have fallen to the floor. "Guess they were looting and one of them decided he wanted everything. Did they shoot each other?"

Daryl cranes his neck to peer down at the mangled face of one of the walkers. "Yeah. Maybe. 'N over a few pounds of candy." He roughly rips out his second arrow.

Carol has dropped the magazines from the guns and now she's popping out the bullets and counting them as she lines them up one by one on the dusty orange table top. "Fourteen total."

"Caliber?" Daryl asks.

".38. I call dibs."

"Ya want the guns, too?"

"No, I have more guns than I know what to do with in the Kingdom. They're kind of useless with so little ammunition."

Daryl picks up one of the guns from the table, double checks it's unloaded, slaps the now empty magazine back inside, and then drops it in his pack. "Hershey needs one to practice dry firin'."

"Hershel's barely five."

"Yeah. Late start."

Carol shakes her head, crouches down, and searches the walker's pockets. She finds another magazine loaded with seven bullets. "Then I suppose you can have this one."

The stench of long-spoiled milk is even greater than that of decaying walker flesh, so they make quick work of searching the kitchen, which yields nothing salvageable except three unopened, well-sealed ketchup bottles, two unopened canisters of salt, and a roll of paper towels, still in the plastic wrap. But these days, that's a jackpot find, especially the bullets, which are like gold.

They sit on the curb to eat a snack from their packs. They don't want to eat inside with that stench. Carol hands Daryl a bag of pork rinds made from the skin of the Kingdom's pigs, and he gives her a handful of raisins dried from the Hilltop's grapes.

"This really brings back memories," she says. "My first date was at a Dairy Queen."

"Hell kind of white trash piece of shit takes a girl on a first date to the DQ?"

Carol snorts.

"Hell," Daryl continues, "even Merle took his first dates to a proper sit-down place. Waffle House."

"I've never heard the Waffle House referred to as a proper sit-down place."

Daryl smirks. "They had waitresses."

"Well, my first date was only thirteen. So I think you should cut him some slack. Harold Harrison."

" _Harold_? Fuck kind of name is _Harold_?"

"Harold's a perfectly good name!" Carol protests. "It's a king's name."

"Pfft."

"Harold Harrison. He had his own paper route, so he had a little cash. He invited me to ride bikes with him after school up to the Dairy Queen. His treat, he said. I wasn't really thinking. I was so hungry. So I ordered the chicken finger basket _and_ a Coke _and_ the biggest ice cream sundae they had."

"Dick move."

"So I learned. He was counting out his quarters nervously on the countertop, and then he just ordered a cup of water for himself. I felt terrible."

"Should of felt terrible. Poor kid."

"Well I _did_ share my sundae with him."

"The sundae _he_ bought ya, ya mean?"

Carol shrugs.

"Hope ya at least gave 'em a blowjob after."

"We were thirteen!" Carol gasps.

Daryl flushes and stares down inside his canteen. Then he busies himself with a deep swig. When the neck of the canteen slurps out of his mouth, she's still looking suspiciously at him, so he asks, "How long y'all date? You 'n _Harold Harrison_?"

"Three years."

Daryl's eyes widen. "Ya shittin' me?" He expected her to say a week or two. The longest middle-school romance in his neck of Georgia lasted four weeks, but that was some kind of record.

"Eighth grade through tenth grade. I thought we'd end up married."

"What happened?"

"I wouldn't put out. I just wasn't ready. But Kimberly Jansen was."

"Skank."

Carol smiles lightly. "Harold broke my heart. But I learned my lesson. I put out right away with the next boyfriend." She sighs and twists the lid onto her canteen. "And with the next. And then with Ed. I thought I _had_ to. But after I buried Ed, I decided – I'm _not_ going to be that girl anymore. That's why I didn't have sex with Tobin."

"Are you shittin' me?" She lived in his house for a while. Shared his bed, Daryl assumed.

"No. I didn't let it go that far. I was enjoying being in control of that. And with Zeke…I suppose I wanted to see how serious he was. So I told him not until our wedding night."

" _Now_ yer shittin' me." He knows they slept together before their wedding night. She told him Ezekiel snored. Did they really just _sleep_?

She shakes her head. "Nope. I drew that line. And he was patient and understanding, as Zeke always was." She pops her last raisin in her mouth, chews, and swallows. "I just wanted to do things _differently_. But in retrospect, maybe waiting wasn't the best idea."

The last thing Daryl wants to think about is Carol and Ezekiel having sex, but he can't help it - curiosity gets the better of him. "How so?"

"The sex was…" She shrugs and clips her canteen to the pack that sits on the curb beside her. "Mediocre. But by then we were married. I'd taken a _vow_. And it didn't seem right to break a vow made to a good and honest man who loved me. I liked the family we'd built with Henry. The partnership we'd crafted in leading the Kingdom. And, if I'm honest, I liked being wooed. Being treated like a queen. So I avoided the sex until it had been too long. He wouldn't _say_ it had been too long, but I could tell by the way he would mope around the Kingdom."

Conflicting emotions slam against each other in Daryl's chest. There's that jealous part of him that's glad she never slept with Tobin and that gloats to learn that Ezekiel was far from a king in bed, but then there's that other part of him that longs for Carol to be happy and simply feels sad to think that when she finally had a non-abusive marriage, it wasn't everything she dreamed it would be. "Damn," he mutters. "That mean ya ain't _never_ had sex you liked?"

"I never _hated_ sex. Except sometimes with Ed." Daryl tenses instinctively. "With the two boyfriends I had sex with before Ed, and with Zeke...I just didn't _enjoy_ it all that much. But maybe that's just what sex is like. Maybe people exaggerate about how good it is."

"Ain't no exaggeration."

"Well, you're a man."

"Maggie sure liked it."

Carol chuckles. "Remember that day she and Glenn wouldn't come down from the prison tower?"

Daryl ignores her question. "Did ya tell 'em?"

"That everyone could hear them? No! Why would I."

"No, did ya tell 'Zeke? That it weren't no good."

"Why would I have _told_ him? That would just have hurt his feelings."

"'Cause then maybe he could of done somethin' 'bout it!"

"Done _what_?" she asks.

"Dunno. Somethin' else than whatever the hell he was doin'!" He's pretty damn sure Ezekiel would have tried to please the woman he loved, if she'd told him how. "Gotta tell a guy. He don't just _know_."

"Tell him what?"

"What ya like," Daryl growls in frustration. He's not even sure why he's so bothered by this. He just knows that if he was in Ezekiel's place, he'd hate to leave Carol disappointed and not even _know_ it. "What ya don't. If ya want him to do somethin'. If ya don't want 'em to do somethin'. Touch here, not there. Harder. Slower…" Daryl suddenly realizes what he's saying and flushes, ending in a a mutter, "Whatever."

"But then he would just feel hurt and self-defensive, and the sex probably wouldn't get any better." She stands from the curb and slings her backpack over her shoulders. "Come on. We need to find decent shelter before the sun sets."

Daryl tries to process these words that have come out of Carol's mouth – the mouth of this bad ass woman who hasn't taken shit from _anyone_ in years, this general in war, this queen who rules and defends an entire Kingdom but apparently still thinks she shouldn't tell a man what to do in bed. He just can't wrap his mind around it.

"Are you coming?" she asks as she unties the horses. She vaults herself up on hers.

Daryl murmurs something indecipherable, rises to his feet, and mounts his speckled mare. Carol's already spurred her mare into a trot. He clicks his tongue at Freckles, gives the horse a light kick of his heel, and soon catches up.


	5. Chapter 5

As their camp for the night, they choose a historical site – a sturdy brick house in the midst of a wide open, overgrown field. It has plenty of grass for the horses to graze on, and a chimney that indicates there's a fireplace for cooking food. It's far from the tree line, so they'll be able to see any threat coming a half mile away.

They tether the horses to the tall columns that hold up a balcony that was once white before half the paint peeled off. Daryl secures barbwire to the side of the house and unrolls it to form a perimeter around part of the front yard while Carol drapes the horses with bells. This way, they'll have time and warning if walkers try to come and feast on them.

When Daryl's done, he finds Carol using a handkerchief to rub off the dirt on the black plaque by the front door.

"Hell you doin' that for? We ain't movin' in."

"I just want to see who lived here. Why it's famous. This house looks like it was built in the early 1800s. Can you read any of that?"

There's too much grime, and Daryl can only make out a faded gold word here or there. "Says Robert E. Lee fucked here."

Carol rolls her eyes and puts the dirty handkerchief in her back pocket. "Get a rock, why don't you."

Daryl tries the door handle first. He won't be fooled again. But it's locked, so he finds a big rock and smashes it against one of the window panels beside the front door until it finally shatters. Then he reaches inside, fumbles, and finally manages to unlock the door.

While Carol opens it, he poises his crossbow to clear the way.

"Let's hope it's not haunted with the ghosts of Civil War soldiers," she says as she draws her knife and prowls in behind him.

Carefully, they clear the entire house, downstairs and upstairs. The entire place is empty. Carol pauses in the last room upstairs, where a canopied bed and dresser are roped off and a long informational sign stands before them. Daryl comes to a stop beside her, puzzled by her seeming interest.

"During the Ciivil War," she reads, "the house served as a hospital for both Confederate and Union soldiers, depending on who was in charge of the area at the time. A cannonball struck the house and remained lodged in the wall for a hundred years until a souvenir hunter stole it the 1960s."

"Hell's a souvenir hunter?"

"Someone who hunts souvenirs, I presume." She laughs to herself. "Ezekiel was a bit of a souvenir hunter. He took us on a quest for a projection bulb once."

"Hell for?"

"To show movies to the children."

"Why'n hell didn't ya just use a DVD player 'n a TV?" There must have been a dozen of them in that school, and the Kingdom used to have those portable power packs. Carol still probably has a few squirreled away somewhere, a secret from the Alliance.

"That wouldn't have been romantic enough for Ezekiel. That was one of the things I both loved and hated about him. He was foolishly idealistic. Like Henry."

 _Foolishly idealistic._ That's one way to put it, Daryl supposes. _Dumb ass_ would be his own word choice, but he doesn't tell Carol that.

"Although….I guess that's what I'm being, huh?" she asks. "Dragging you on this silly road trip."

"Ya couldn't drag me if ya tried. 'M too damn heavy for ya." She snorts and he ducks his head and smiles. "C'mon," he urges. "'S go back down. Saw some liquor in that fancy study."

When they get to the study, Daryl heads straight for the decanter on the shelf behind the leather chair, but Carol wanders over to a historical ledger on display on a pedestal. The rays of the setting sun dance over the open, yellowed pages. "This is a record of all the wounded soldiers who stayed here during the Civil War," she tells him. "My mother told me my great-great grandfather fought in the Civil War."

"Yeah? He fight under Lee?" Daryl asks as he twists and tugs at the top of the decanter. The dark brown liquid sloshes inside. "Or Jackson?"

"He fought for the Army of Virginia, not the Army of Northern Virginia."

"Ya mean he turned coat?" The top pops, and Daryl sets the crystal knob on the desk. "Fought for the damn Yankees?"

"He stayed _loyal_ to the Union," Carol corrects him.

He sniffs at the brown liquid. "'S yer great-great granddaddy's name?"

"Jonathan Arnold Mercer. My mother said we could trace our lineage all the way back to one of the FFVs."

"Who vee whats?"

"First Families of Virginia. The wealthy elite who descended from the colonists who settled Jamestown and Williamsburg. She said I was born to great things, that she'd been well-off herself, before she married my father, who squandered the family fortune gambling in Mississippi and then took off with some other woman the week after I was born."

"Yer mama was rich?"

"I don't think so. I think that was just a story she liked to tell, so I would dream of escaping our tiny Georgia town. Of course I never did."

"Sure ya did. Yer a goddamn _queen_."

Carol smiles. "I meant I never escaped before the apocalypse. Lived there my whole life." She runs her finger down the ledger and turns a page. "But my mother's maiden name really _was_ Mercer. That much is true. I've seen her birth certificate."

Daryl takes a swig of whatever's in the decanter. Brown liquid spews out his mouth and splatters all over a painting of the Army of Northern Virginia. The liquor drips down the curled Confederate battle flag at the far edge of the canvas.

"Spoiled?" she asks.

"Tastes like rancid beef."

"It's been open too long, but there's some completely unopened bottles in there." She points to the locked liquor cabinet above the shelf that held the decanter. "I guess the docent got thirsty."

"The who?" Daryl begins rummaging through the desk drawers in search of the key to the liquor cabinet.

"The docent. You know, a museum guide. I always wanted to be a docent when I was a little girl."

Daryl seizes a small, iron key from next to a stapler remover in the top drawer. "Who the fuck wants to grow up to be a dough cent?"

"Me, _that's_ who. I just told you."

"Mean 'sides you," he answers while he unlocks the cabinet.

"Why?" Carol turns another page. "What did you want to grow up to be when you were a boy?"

"Nascar driver." The cabinet creaks open and Daryl coughs at the emerging dust. He begins to draw down the bottles and set them on the desk.

"Well, my goal was a little more realistic. Or maybe not. I dropped out of high school my senior year to work full-time when my mom got sick. There's no chance I could have gotten a history Ph.D. And I probably couldn't have been a docent even if I had. I was much too shy."

Daryl snorts.

"I _was_ ," she insists as she turns another page in the book and scans the names. "I was terrified of public speaking. You know how shy I was when I met you."

The bottles clank against the oak desk as Daryl lines them up. "Hell you want to be a dough cent for then?"

"I liked history. I liked learning about it. And I suppose I liked to imagine people would care about what I had to say." She shrugs and starts helping him take down the rest of the unopened bottles. "No one ever cared what I had to say."

"Well they sure as fuck care now."

"They do," she agrees. "Well, the people at the Kingdom do. _You_ I'm not so sure about. I mean, I told you we should have stuck to the highway back there."

"Gonna go faster if we take back roads. We'd just get jammed up on the main one."

"It's not like we're driving. We're going to go twenty miles out of our way this way. And there will be less to loot in the boonies."

"Less to loot? Look what we just found, woman!" He waves his hand roughly across the array of bottles.

"Fair enough." Carol returns to study the ledger. Daryl's looking over the labels on the bottles by the fading light of the sun when she gasps suddenly. "I found it! I found his name!"

Daryl strolls over and looks down at her finger on the page, below the dark black cursive swirls of an ancient ink pen. He has no idea why she's so excited about this, why she gives two shits about some long dead ancestors of hers, in a time that doesn't exist anymore, in a _world_ that doesn't exist. But the quivering smile on her face twists his gut into all kinds of strange knots.

"He was wounded in the left leg," she says. "He stayed here." She laughs. "I can't believe we found this!"

"Glad we didn't stick to the highway now, huh?"

"Thank you." She kisses his cheek, which leaves a burning sensation on his flesh. "Thank you for giving me this."

Daryl chews on his bottom lip. He hasn't _given_ her a damn thing. He just came along with her. But he likes that she thinks he has.

"Even if no evidence of my lineage turns up in Jamestown, I can always say I found this." She rips the page out of the ledger.

Say it to who, Daryl wonders, say it why? But clearly it's important to her, this journey to explore her roots in a world that has become untangled. "C'mon," he mutters gently. "Losin' light. Need to get settled in."


	6. Chapter 6

While Carol breaks up a chair and tears up a book for firewood and kindling, Daryl goes to check on the horses and snag something for supper. He comes back with a snake, which he skinned outside, and sets it to roasting on a spit over the fire. He sees she's laid out both their sleeping bags in front of the fireplace, unzipped, one on top of the other as a blanket. Apparently they're sharing a bed tonight. His nerves dance with nervous electricity.

They sit on the couch to eat, and when they've had their snake bites, water, and dried apricots from the Kingdom, Daryl grabs one of the already opened bottles of alcohol they've put on the coffee table and takes a timid sip.

"How's that one?" Carol asks.

"Ain't good." He tries another open one – vodka this time - and declares it "drinkable" before passing the bottle to Carol.

"Does this count as a vegetable?" she asks.

Daryl huffs and watches her sip. She rolls the liquid on her tongue for a minute before swallowing. "I can barely taste anything."

"Well, yeah. 'S vodka."

"Try another open one," she says.

"How'd I get to be yer royal taster?"

"Fine. I'll try." She grabs a bottle of apple schnapps, sips, coughs, and chokes it down.

"Thatta a no?"

"That's a no," she confirms.

"I'll try the tequila."

In the end, they find only the vodka, gin, and brandy to be drinkable.

"The open bottles are for our road trip," Carol determines. "But how are we divvying up the _unopened_ bottles?"

"Kingdom can have the Southern Comfort. Hilltop'll take the Jack Daniels. Kingdom can– "

"- I don't think so. _Hilltop_ can have the Southern Comfort."

"Shoot ya for the Jack."

"Fine." She makes a fist. So does he. "Scissors," she chants, "papers, rock, shoot!" His hand is spread out like paper, and her fingers are opened in scissors. "I win."

"Nah, this is magic paper."

She slides her fingers over and under his and squeezes.

"See, can't cut through," he says.

She squeezes _hard_. "Ow," he complains and draws his hand away. "Best two outta three."

In the end, the six unopened bottles of liquor are divvied up and packed away for the two communities. Carol turns on the couch, her arm stretched out across the back behind Daryl's shoulders, and says, "Let's play a drinking game."

"'S not."

"But it's a road trip! What good is a road trip without a drinking game?"

"What drinkin' game?"

"Truth or Dare."

"Truth or Dare ain't a drinkin' game."

"We could say you have to tell the truth or take a drink." She looks at the expression on his face and realizes her mistake. "Never mind. You'd just always take a drink. Let's say you only _get_ to take a drink if you answer the question truthfully."

"'N what about dares?"

"No dares."

"So's just truth?"

"Truth and drink!" she says, and he can't help but smile at her childish pleasure in her own name choice.

"Ain't much of a _game_. More like talkin' 'n drinkin'."

"You got something better to do?"

"Sleep maybe." She doesn't say anything, but in the warm glow of the fireplace, the soft lines of her face crinkle in disappointment, and he instantly recants. "A'ight, a'ight. I'll play yer stupid game."

Carol smiles a little deviously, as if she knew all along he would. She leans back against the arm of the couch. "Okay, truth and drink. Where did _you_ take _your_ first date? I know it wasn't the DQ."

Daryl's never been on a date in his life. He finally lost his virginity at nineteen to Merle's girlfriend's sister. She must have been thirty, or maybe she was only twenty and she just _looked_ thirty because of the drugs. Daryl later learned Merle paid her to come onto him. _Because it's goddamn shameful_ , Merle told him, _a Dixon and still a virgin at nineteen._ _God knows you weren't gonna get that cherry popped on your own._

Daryl hated Merle for that. He was suspicious of every woman who showed interest in him after that, though he couldn't help but fuck a few anyway because the fucking felt good. He always assumed they had some motivate other than genuine interest in him. Either they just wanted to get off and didn't much care who did the getting, or they wanted Daryl to buy them some drinks at the bar, or Merle was giving them drugs. But he was pretty sure it never had anything to do with _him_ personally.

"None of yer damn business," he growls.

"Touchy!"

"Sorry," he mutters.

"It's not like I asked something really _personal._ And even if I had…it's just _me_."

Just _her_. She says that like she isn't the person who, more than anyone else in this entire world, he longs to have respect him.

"I thought we told each other things," she says. "We used to, anyway. Didn't we?"

She says those words with such a tint of sadness that he bursts out, "Ain't never been on a date. Ain't never took a girl nowhere."

"Ah."

"Ain't a virgin," he clarifies.

"I assumed not."

"So…yeah. Just random fuckin'." He seizes the bottle of vodka and takes a drink.

Carol doesn't look particularly surprised by this revelation, but she doesn't look disgusted or disappointed either. He wonders for a minute why he thought she would be. She's right. It's _Carol_. She's seen the darkest underside of him over the years, they've lived in different communities and walked in different worlds, she's been with more sheltered men with less shameful pasts, and yet after all that she's still _here_ , sitting right beside _him_ on this couch.

"Your turn to ask a question," she says.

There's a dozen questions he wants to ask her, rattling around in his brain. Did she marry Ezekiel because she _really_ loved him? Or did she just respect him and want the fantasy family she'd never had? Why does she think the sex wouldn't have gotten better if she'd told the king what to do? Does she think Ezekiel wouldn't have listened? Or does she think a man _can't_ improve? That he's either good or not, from the start? Did she like that kiss last night? Why hasn't she mentioned it? Would she want another? Or is he a terrible kisser, and she doesn't think he could ever get better by trying? That night when she brought him dinner on watch at the prison – and she asked if he wanted to fool around – that was a _joke_ , right? What would she have done if he'd said _yes_?

But he doesn't ask any of those questions. "This genealogy shit," he says. "Why's it so damn important to ya?"

"I guess…" She muses on his question for a while, and he waits. "I want to think it matters."

"That what matters?"

"That they lived. Because I want to think it matters that _we_ lived, that we're building this world for our heirs, the way one of my ancestors helped build Jamestown, and another helped preserve the Union. I want to think that what we're building means something, and one day our heirs will want to know about us, too."

"Mhm." It makes sense, in a way, when she puts it like that. "But I ain't gonna have no heirs." He doesn't have a Henry.

"You're going to have a thousand heirs. The generations that come will inherit what you've helped build."

"Ain't no one gonna wanna know 'bout me though."

"Legends will get passed down as our communities grow. And Hershel and Judith both think of you as an uncle. Their kids will know about you. Trust me." She takes the vodka bottle, sips, and sets it back on the table. "Okay, my turn. Who do you think is the prettiest woman at the Hilltop?"

What the hell kind of question is that? "Dunno."

"If you don't answer, you don't get to drink."

"Did answer. Dunno. Don't think about it."

A scolding look crosses her face. "Really? You've never _once_ looked at a woman at the Hilltop and thought she was attractive?"

Daryl's not the best reader of women, but he gets a weird sensation this is some kind of trap. He settles on the oldest woman he can think of. "Tammy," he says.

Carol laughs. "I bet she _was_ beautiful in her day. I was, too, believe it or not."

" _Was_?" he asks almost angrily. "In yer _day_?"

The smile she gives him brightens her eyes in the dancing flames of the fire and makes him nervous. He reaches for the bottle and takes his sip. He can't think of anything he has the balls to ask, so he just flips her question back on her. "Who ya think's the best-looking man at the Hilltop?"

He doesn't understand why she chuckles.

"I think I'll skip my drink this round," Carol answers. "My turn for a question. Who do you find to be the most _annoying_ person at Hilltop?"

He blows out a puff of air, in a sort-of "Whoo."

"Too long a list?" she asks with a smirk.

"Yeah. Not sure who to put at the top of that one." He thinks a minute. "Probably Aidan. Got that… _voice_. And he's so damn…sanctimonious."

"Sanctimonious?"

"I got a vocabulary."

"I know." She hands him the vodka bottle. "I don't know where you got it though. I've never seen you pick up a book." That's not true. She saw him pick up _Surviving Childhood Abuse_ when it fell out of his backpack. She saw it and didn't say a word, because she knew it would only embarrass him if she did, and he appreciated her silence. "I think the last one I saw you read was that one Andrea gave you after she shot you."

"Couldn't finish it. Didn't have no pictures." He takes a sip.

"You read it cover to cover. Twice in one day."

"Only 'cause I didn't have shit else to do."

"Why don't you like to read for pleasure?" she asks.

"'Cause readin' don't accomplish nothin'. 'Less yer readin' for information. And 's my turn for a question, not yers."

"Shoot."

"How come ya read them trashy romance novels? Aren't ya too smart for that shit?"

She looks embarrassed and sounds defensive. "What makes you think I do?"

"Seen 'em in that little house ya used to live in. Seen 'em in your room at the school. Can tell by the covers."

"Sometimes I like not having to think." She slips the bottle from his hand, tips it back, and swallows a big sip this time before setting it on the coffee table. "Why didn't you come to my wedding?"

His muscles tense the way they used to when he heard the growl of a walker, before killing a walker became second nature. "Ya know why. 'S lookin' for Rick's body."

"You couldn't take one day off from the search?"

"Thought I was gettin' close," he lies.

But he didn't even look for Rick's body that day. He went out hunting walkers instead, for hours, wetting his knife with blood, kicking and stabbing and not much caring if he slipped up and one of them sank its teeth into his arm. One almost did, and he would have let it, too, if that dog hadn't come out of nowhere and started barking at the walkers. Dog is back home at the Hilltop, now, nursing a sprained ankle, being spoiled with loving by Hershel and the other kids.

Daryl takes a big sip.

"Your turn. "

He runs a finger around the rim of the bottle until it whistles. "Was it happy?" he ventures, since she brought up the wedding. "Yer marriage?"

She's taking a long time to answer. "I was content," she says at last. "And I hadn't felt content since…well, since those few months in the prison, when it was peaceful, and we were building. Before..." She trails off.

"Mhmhm..." Daryl mutters. "That group of ours, felt like we could do anything together. Like...like we was family."

"But Rick kicked me out of the family. And no one protested. Everyone just…went along with it."

"Wasn't _there_ , Carol. He didn't give me no say."

"But you forgave him instantly."

Is that why she left Alexandria? Because she didn't feel like she could be a part of the family again? Is that why she pulled away from him? For Tobin, and then for the king?

"Rick went back for Merle," he says,"even after Merle practically tried to kill 'em. Rick stepped up to lead when no one else would. He kept us alive. 'N…he was the first man ever respected me. My father never did. My brother never did. Merle loved me, in his way, but he didn't _respect_ me." He turns his head slightly to look at her. "I was angry he sent you away, but bein' angry didn't solve nothin'. It would have killed me, if I'd held a grudge against him." Carol doesn't reply, so he asks, "Ya still angry at me 'bout that?"

"No. I was never angry at you. Just… _hurt_."

"Still hurt?"

She sighs. "Only when I think about it too much. Which I try not to do. I just think about all the ways you've tried to ease my hurt over the years. The way you searched for Sophia." She reaches out her hand for the bottle, and her fingers brush his when he hands it over. "The way you killed that walker child for me, so I didn't have to." She takes a sip. "The way you tried to let me have my peace, instead of telling me what happened to you and the others at the hands of the Saviors." She sets the bottle on her knee. "But I miss those days sometimes. Back in the prison. We _were_ like a family. And now you and I are the only ones left."

"'Chonne," he reminds her.

"Yes. Of course. I haven't seen her since Zeke's funeral. How is she?"

"Good. Almost like...almost like the old 'Chonne came back finally."

Carol smiles. "Really?"

"She's datin' some supply runner."

" _Really_?"

"Yeah." He huffs. "Guess gettin' laid loosened 'er up. Smiles now."

They've stopped playing the game, but they keep passing the bottle and talking. Carol takes bigger sips than he does, and when she closes one eye and stares down the neck of the empty bottle, he says, "Better get to bed."

She's tipsy when she tires to pull off her boots. She keeps tugging at them without unlacing them, so Daryl kneels down before her and unties them.

"Sexy," she says and giggles.

"Stahp." The laces undone, he yanks off one, and then the other. He stands and gives her a hand to help her up from the couch.

"I need to take off my knives." She has similar trouble unsnapping the sheaths, so he helps. While he unsaps them one by one, she puts a hand on each of his hips to steady herself and leans her forehead against his shoulder. He has to push her back to slide out the knives in their sheaths and lay them on the coffee table.

She manages to undo her belt buckle, but when she tugs at it, the belt barely budges. "Help!" she cries.

"Jesus," he mutters, and seizes the buckle and yanks hard. The belt slides free of the loops with a snap.

"Naughty," she says and giggles again.

"Ya need to get to bed."

Carol stumbles over to the bed she's made and crawls beneath the top sleeping bag.

Daryl takes off his own boots, props his bow nearby the mantle, and lays his knives on the coffee table before draping his belt over the armchair. Then he crawls in beside her and lies down on his back.

She immediately turns toward him, lays her head on his shoulder, and rests her bent arm on his chest. Every nerve in his body jumps to attention. "Is this okay?" she asks.

"Mhmhm. 'S fine."

"The room is spinning," she says. "One of us should have stayed sober in case walkers come for the horses."

"'M sober. Takes a hell of a lot more than that."

"Guess I'm a lightweight." Carol closes her eyes. "You could take advantage of me if you wanted, you know," she says. She's talking fast, but not really slurring. "But you won't. You're such a Boy Scout. Pookie the Redneck Boy Scout."

"Yer drunk."

"Your powers of observation are astounding." She giggles. "That would make a great children's book, wouldn't it? _Pookie the Redneck Boy Scout_. I'm going to write it. You can read it to your kids."

"Ain't got no kids."

"You'd make adorable babies." That's the last thing she says. Pretty soon she's jerking in a sleep dance.

He wraps an arm around her to soothe the jerking and tries not to think of the soft, pert feel of her breasts against his side.

It's a long time before he falls asleep.


	7. Chapter 7

Daryl awakens to the sound of grinding. The sun streams through the dusty lace curtains, and a kettle hums above the freshly lit fire.

Carol sits in the arm chair cranking the black iron lever of some handheld contraption. "Good morning, sleepy head. You were sleeping like the dead."

"Dead don't sleep."

"Well like a baby then."

That's because an hour after he finally fell asleep, the horses whinnied and the bells jangled, and he had to go out and kill two walkers and reset the barwire. Then he couldn't get back to sleep until near morning. Carol slept through it all, in a gentle, drunken snore. "Hell ya doin'?" he asks.

"Grinding coffee beans." She nods to the French press on the coffee table.

"Kingdom's got _coffee beans_?"

"We grow a few."

"Damn. All we got is that instant shit with a twenty-year shelf life."

"Well, you're in for a treat."

He stands and steps into his boots. "How's yer head?"

"It'll be fine after I have some coffee. Why? Was I pretty drunk last night?"

He huff-laughs as he picks up his crossbow. .

"Did I say anything embarrassing?"

"Nah," he lies. "Goin' out to take a piss." He checks on the horses while he's out there, and when he comes back, Carol is pouring coffee out of the French press into two tin camp cups.

He mumbles a thanks when she hands him one, and it _is_ a treat. He thinks it must be the best damn coffee he's ever had, though it probably isn't. This world makes the once ordinary precious.

Carol pats the couch cushion beside herself, which he supposes means he's supposed to sit, so he does. The steam curls up and around her nose as she lowers her cup after a sip. "My head _does_ hurt."

"Need to hydrate. Coffee ain't gonna do it."

"I drank a bunch of water when I woke up. Now I need caffeine." She sips again.

Daryl sets his cup down for a moment, draws his roadmap of Virginia out of his backpack, and smooths it out on the coffee table before picking up the cup again. "We're hereabouts." He smacks his finger down on the town of Dumfries. "'N Jamestown," he runs his finger in a diagonal line south and slightly east, "'S here." While he sips, he puts his thumb and forefinger and inch apart and swivels to measure the distance. "Be three or four days." He's a little disappointed when he says it aloud. When they first set out, he was hoping this trip would be closer to three weeks total. He didn't want it to run into June, but he didn't want it to be over so soon either.

Carol leans forward to look at the map. "My great grandfather George Aaron Mercer, the son of the man whose name I found in that ledger, is buried in Staunton. I kind of wanted to check out his hometown and see his grave. I guess that's too far out of the way west of Jamestown, though, isn't it?"

Daryl measures a path with his fingers. "Add another four days each way." Which would mean twelve days together, before this journey is done. "But ya don't have to be back 'til mid-May, right?"

"No. But what about you? Do you mind?"

"Nah. 'S fine by me." He studies the map, but he can feel that she's studying his face.

"I'm really glad you agreed to come on this trip with me," she says. "It means a lot."

"Ain't got nothin' better to do."

"Yeah. You do. You have a town to hunt for. A bike to tinker with. A little boy to help raise. But you chose this. I appreciate it."

Daryl folds the map. He doesn't look at her. "Like spendin' time with ya."

He can feel, rather than see, her smile. "You do?"

He murmurs something indecipherable and shoves the map back into his backpack.

"I've missed this," she admits. "You and me. On the road. Like Thelma and Louise."

 _Thelma and Louise?_ He must look some kind of something at that remark, because she says, "Bad comparison. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid?"

"Nah. They had a third wheel." Sundance's girl. _Etta_ , if he remembers the movie right.

Carol takes a sip of her coffee. "Bonnie and Clyde?"

"Who we gonna rob?"

"More like _what_ are we going to _loot_. There has to be something good between here and there." She sips quietly for a minute and says, "I really _am_ glad you're doing this with me, Daryl. I've missed you."

Daryl finishes off his coffee in silence. He rarely visited the Kingdom when she was married, because he thought she'd moved on from him, that she was trying to forget the dark past they'd plowed through together at the quarry and the farm, in the prison and in Alexandria, and on the road in between. He thought she wanted to forget all the bodies they'd buried together.

He started coming more often after Ezekiel was dead, at first just to check up on her, to make sure she was handling the loss. But after a while, he wasn't coming to check up on her anymore. He was coming because he couldn't help coming, because he _needed_ to see her.

It never occurred to him that she _needed_ to see him, too.

Carol stands and begins packing up for the road. He follows her in silence outside and unwinds the barbwire perimeter and stores the twine away. After they mount their horses, and she lifts the reins, he mumbles, "Missed ya, too."

Then he clicks to his horse, spurs it with his heel, and rides ahead.

[*]

That evening they enter a nameless town. No doubt it had a name once, but they can't make it out on the bullet-riddled, time-blackened entry sign; they can only make out the words beneath the town's name: Population 1,382. The walker population, however, appears to be zero.

"Looks like folks got the hell out of Dodge when it started," Daryl says as his horse walks with a gentle clomping down the crumbling asphalt of a ghostly street.

"Which could mean they left without looting everything," Carol suggests.

"Guess we'll find out."

They break into an elementary school first, one of only three schools in town, and find medicines in the nurse's office. They've found that they can push expirations dates for several years on some things. Daryl tosses a rattling bottle of Advil to Carol and orders, "Take four, 'cause they's only gonna half work."

She does.

They find the middle school next and hit that nurse's office, too, by, which time they've filled half a saddle bag with bottles of pills, gauze, rubbing alcohol, tape, and other medical supplies. They're feeling confident when they locate the high school, but they learn that's where many of the townspeople went. It was probably converted to a shelter at the start, because it now teems with walkers that throw themselves against the inside windows and doors, rattling against their confines, hungry and desperate but unable to get out.

The couple presses on while it's still daylight and run the horses hard to find a decent camp before sunset. A few miles up a windy hill just outside of the town, they come across a "bed and breakfast" on a vineyard. The exterior of the once all-white Spanish colonial structure has grayed over the years, but inside, the lobby is still impressive, with marbled floors, antique furniture, and an ornate chandler hanging from the high ceiling. It also has only a thin layer of dust, which makes them think someone's lived here within the last year or two.

They leave the horses drinking from pans of water in the lobby while they clear the place. They end killing six walkers and corralling the bodies in a single room at the far end of the place to confine the stench. A family must have hunkered down here, maybe from the start, but within the last year or two, one or more died and turned and killed the rest. The kitchen has been entirely picked over. The tasting room is full of empty wine bottles, and the snacks have been largely cleared out from bookshelves and corner stands, but a few unopened bottles of wine remain. They line up twenty on the tasting counter and also salvage six unopened snack bags of in-the-shell pistachios. There are a few hard sausages in unopened plastic, too, but they can't risk those, as they can see splotches of green in the brown.

Carol looks over the line of wine bottles. "These will fill two whole saddle bags. We can't take them all. Between the liquor and the medical supplies and these, we'll barely have any room left."

"So? Whenever we gotta make room, just drink a bottle."

"I suppose we should drink one tonight, then." She puts her finger on top of the third from the left. "How about a red blend? Or would you prefer a Pinot Noir?"

"All the same to me. Long as I get a buzz."

"Well I doubt that's going to happen on half a bottle. At least not for _you_."

While Daryl rummages behind the tasting bar for a corkscrew and opens the wine, Carol wipes out some dusty glasses. Then, while he struggles with the cork, Carol lights the fireplace in the brown brick hearth before a black leather couch, plops down, and says, "Oh, wow. This is so comfortable! Come see."

He hands her a glass of wine, and she takes a careful sip before it spills over. "You know," she says as he sits down next to her and a little wine sloshes over the rim of his glass and onto his fingers, "you're only supposed to pour five ounces. Not fill the glass _all the way_ to the top." She laughs at the annoyed look he gives her and raises her glass. "Salud."

"Cheers." He clinks her glass and takes a big sip of his. "Ain't half bad." He licks the spilled wine off his fingers one by one. He stops when he notices her staring at his lips. She must think it's a disgusting habit of his, but she doesn't _look_ disgusted. She's smiling a little.

"What do you taste?" Carol raises an eyebrow. " _Cherry_?"

Based on the suggestive way she says that, she must be trying to make some kind of sexual joke, something to do with popping a cherry, but he doesn't quite get what she's aiming for. He laughs not because the joke is funny, but because she's so damn cute trying to make it. "Stahp."

"Well, I taste cherry. And hints of black currant."

"Yeah?"

"No," she admits. "I don't even know what black currant is. It just said hints of black currant on the bottle."

"'S a berry. 'S black. Looks kinda like a blueberry. Ain't native to the U.S.. 'S bullshit. Ain't no hints of black currant 'n here. I taste tobacco."

"Well, that makes sense. It is Virginia." After she sips, she says, "We should probably have more than wine for dinner."

"Want me to hunt?"

"No, it's dark already." The tasting room is lit only by the fireplace, which paints Carol's face in soft shadows. "You're tired. Let's just eat some of those pistachios we found. And a little of the deer jerky you brought."

They're content with their light meal. Daryl goes to get the bottle and stands to refill Carol's now empty glass, again to the brim. Carol smiles and puts her stocking feet up on the coffee table, beside a decorative, golden bird cage full of wine corks.

Daryl doesn't bother to refill his glass. He just takes a swig straight from the bottle instead. Still holding the bottle, he plops down next to her and kicks the bird cage off the table with his foot. It clatters to the ground and rolls before the hearth. He settles his feet next to hers. His socks are filthy, he realizes, and there's a hole in the left one. Maybe he should check the dressers in the rooms in the morning for a clean pair.

"You ever wonder," she asks after she sips, "if we had just roamed like this after the farm, just gone from town to town…never settled at the prison…if we would have lost fewer people?"

"Dunno."

"I suppose we might have starved to death by now, if we hadn't been able to build and garden and store things up for the winter. And back then, there were more bad gangs on the road. We might have been killed by now. And I never would have met Henry."

Henry? _That's_ the first person who comes to her mind? "Or yer husband."

Carol swirls her glass. Dark red ripples break out over the surface of the wine. "I might not have cared about that, if…" She stops and takes a sip.

"If what?"

"If you and I hadn't grown apart like we did," she murmurs. His brain is whirring to process the meaning of those words when she continues, "Those good days at the prison, they were some of the happiest days of my life. But if we hadn't settled there, I'd never have killed Karen and David. Rick never would have banished me. Maybe you wouldn't have been so broken up by losing Beth. Maybe Glenn and Maggie would be raising Hershel, instead of the Hilltop raising him. Maybe, if we'd just gone on wandering after the farm, and _none_ of that had happened, maybe you and I would have…"

 _Would have what?_

"Then again," she continues, not completing her thought, "I wouldn't have met Jerry or Nabila or so many other really good people."

 _Would have what?"_

"You wouldn't have become such good friends with Aaron and Tara. Michonne and Rick never would have gotten together, and there would be no RJ at all. I guess we can't second guess ourselves, can we?"

 _Would have what?_

"This is really good." She takes another sip. "Is my tongue black?" She stretches is out and flattens it downward.

He has a sudden, animalistic urge to lean over and suck her tongue, an urge so powerful it rattles him. He looks away. "Purple."

She doesn't say anything else while she quietly finishes her wine, and neither does he. But when she puts her empty glass on the table, she leans her head on his shoulder. "The fire's so pretty. I guess I get my romantic B&B after all. Though it's more like a castle."

"Mhmhm." He finishes the last of the wine in the bottle, using his left hand to drink since she's leaning on his right shoulder. He doesn't want to lean forward to set the empty bottle on the coffee table and knock her head off his shoulder in the process, so he just tosses it over the arm of the couch. It cracks on the hardwood floor.

Carol closes her eyes. "You know, this is good practice for you."

"Hmh?"

"Taking a girl to a winery. It's good practice if you ever _do_ go on a date."

"Ain't goin' on any dates."

"You wouldn't be so bad at it. You poured the wine and made supper and everything."

"Pfft." _Made supper_. He didn't even _kill_ supper.

He thinks she's fallen asleep when she asks, "Am I making your arm fall asleep?"

"'S fine."

"You can put it around me if that's more comfortable."

So he does, and she takes her feet from the coffee table, half turns, and curls up on the couch against his side. She falls asleep just like that.

Daryl listens to the sound of her gentle breathing, the crackling of the fire, and the horses huffing softly in the lobby beyond the tasting room. He sits there with his arm around her until the fire fades to embers, thinking – _Would have what?_

When the room has grown nearly black, with only a red-orange glow coming from the bottom of the last of the wood, he carefully eases himself out from under her, lowers her head onto a throw pillow, and drapes an unzipped sleeping bag over her. Then he makes his own bed on the floor, not far away.


	8. Chapter 8

Daryl's shoulder touches Carol's in the narrow bed. He stares up at the exposed threads inside the dusty white canopy.

"We are lying in the bed Thomas Jefferson slept in," she says.

"Nah. Someone probably replaced it since then."

"We're at least lying in the _room_ he slept in."

They made good time today and travelled far. The horses are exhausted and well secured in closed stalls inside the locked stone stable. After clearing Monticello, they ended up throwing themselves down, boots and gear still on, for a break on this dusty bed.

"I can't believe no one's settled here," she says. "It already has stables for horses. Old slave quarters that could house dozens of people. A pond for fishing. All that land that once had fields and gardens."

"There was a millin' herd," he replies. "Kept people away."

"Makes sense."

They found the picked-over remains of farm animals, a gazebo with a collapsed wooden floor, and some knocked-over farm fences, but the buildings are all intact. From the looks of the tall grass, though, the herd must have moved on at least two years ago. He and Carol are probably the first people who have come this way since.

The bed shifts slightly as Carol rolls off it. "I'm going to go scavenge that farm to table café for spices." They passed it before they got to the house. They banged on the café's windows long enough to know there were no walkers inside, before they moved on to explore the rest of the grounds. The café appeared untouched, and it would have been a great place to loot if only they'd found it years ago, before almost everything spoiled. "What's for dinner?"

Daryl gets up and grabs the crossbow he's leaned against the antique dresser. "Dunno yet. See what I can rustle up."

"We're definitely eating in Thomas Jefferson's dining room," she tells him.

"Are we pissin' 'n his chamber pot, too?"

"Might as well."

[*]

Light flickers from the candelabra that rests on the yellowed tablecloth. The candles are deformed, having half-melted and then solidified again, but they still burn. The couple drinks red wine from crystal glasses drawn from the hutch and eat the fish Daryl speared with a sharpened tree branch after wading into the pond. Carol seasoned the fish with the salvageable seasonings she snagged from the café and cooked them over a fire in Thomas Jefferson's kitchen.

"Find anythin' 'sides the salt n' pepper 'n…" Daryl gestures to his fish with his fork. "Green stuff?"

"It's dried basil." She cuts a piece of her fish. "I found some other unopened spices. They've probably lost half their savor, but I'll just use twice as much." She takes a bite, and after swallowing, adds, "And I found an unopened canister of dried oats. Steel cut. I guess we'll find out in the morning if it's still edible."

"When'd it expire?"

"Only five years ago."

"Pfft."

"Hey, those dates are just suggestions." She takes a sip of her wine and then asks, "How many pairs of pants did you bring?"

He had to change after fishing, and his pants hang drying by the fireplace in the parlor. "Two."

"We need to find you another one."

"Hell for? Got one to wear while the other dries." He shoves a bite into his mouth.

"The pair you're wearing now is torn out at the left knee."

"'S fine. These're m' house pants."

She snorts. Carol eats quietly for a while, looking around at the various paintings illuminated by the flickering candlelight.

Daryl, his meal now done, belches and pounds his chest.

"Excuse you."

"Mhmm." He takes a swig of his wine.

"I'm training you well for the whole dating scene, when you finally decide to go on a date. I mean, look what we have here." She waves her hand across the table. "Candlelight. Fresh caught fish. The good china _and_ the good silver." She lifts her glass and smiles. "Not to mention the wine. If we could just find a phonograph and some records, I could teach you to dance."

"Pfft," he mocks, but he peers over his wine glass and wonders if she thinks that's what they _would have_ done, if things hadn't fallen apart, if their little group had stayed together, if she'd never seen the Kingdom. Does she think they would have… _dated_?

It's a ridiculous thought. She knows he's not that man, the one who courts a woman, who brings fruits to her doorstep while quoting poetry. He'll never _be_ that man. And now that she's _had_ that man, she can't still want him that way, if she ever did, if that was even what she was saying last night.

Before, she only had Ed to compare Daryl to. Now, she's had a king. Ezekiel may not have been good in bed, but he was good at all the rest of it. And maybe that's why Carol hasn't mentioned Daryl's kiss. Maybe that's why she snuggles up to him sometimes but never does anything more. Because she's got the good sense to know that he'd be a shit lover and an even shittier husband.

And maybe that's for the best. Because they've got something here. He doesn't know what it is they've got, but it's _something_ , and he's not going to piss it all away trying to grab something else, something he's never had, something a man like him probably can't _ever_ have.

Daryl pushes his empty plate forward.

"Shall we adjourn to the drawing room?" Carol asks with a smirk.

[*]

Daryl plops down on the couch in the parlor, holding the wine bottle by its neck. Since Carol said she was done after her second glass, he swigs straight from the bottle while she rustles around in her pack and pulls out some sewing supplies. Between the fireplace and the candles, the room is fairly well lit.

"Take off your pants," she orders.

"What?"

"I need to patch that knee."

"Ain't got no drawers on under."

"You only brought _one_ pair?" She glances at the fireplace, like she expects to see them drying there, but there are only his Wranglers. "You go commando?"

"In the spring 'n summer, sure. 'M balls sweat."

"That was not a level of detail I needed." She shoves her sewing supplies back in her pack. "I'll fix it in the morning before we head out, when your other pair is dry."

[*]

An oil lamp glows gently on the wooden stand. The hydrogen peroxide he snagged from the school nurse's office foams as Daryl scrubs his teeth. He spies Carol in the mirror above the washbasin as she walks into this small bedroom off the parlor.

"When did you develop such good dental hygiene?" she asks.

He spits in the 18th century wash basin. "When Sidiqq had to pull that second tooth."

"I didn't even notice."

"'Cause the gaps are 'n the back." He pours a little water from his canteen over his toothbrush and brushes some more.

"I had one pulled myself last year," she admits. In the mirror, he can see her eyebrow wiggling suggestively. "Show me yours, and I'll show you mine."

"Staaahp." But he turns, opens his mouth wide, and points to the back, first one side, then the other. It only took him a day to get used to eating after the first one was pulled, but it took three weeks to get used to the missing second.

"Hey, we're twinsies." She shows him where she lost a tooth in the same spot as one of his.

He rinses his toothbrush with a little more water, knocks it against the washbasin to get the excess off, and then slips it in the pack he's left on the bed.

"Hydrogen peroxide's a good oral astringent," Carol says, "but it's not exactly minty fresh."

"Got somethin' for that." He draws out the half-empty bottle of Peppermint Schnapps he snagged from the house in Dumfries.

"I thought you said that wasn't drinkable."

"Ain't. No Schnapps is drinkable. But 's got it's uses." He takes a swig, swishes it around in his mouth, and spits in the basin. Then he turns again and breathes right in her face. "See? Minty fresh."

She steps back. "Minty anyway." But then she looks at the bottle like maybe she wants to try, so he hands it over to her before going back to the parlor, where he finds she's laid their sleeping bags before the fireplace, unzipped again, as one bed.

"I thought the beds in this house were too dusty," she explains when she returns from her own washing up and finds him sitting in an arm chair and fiddling with his bow. "Do you mind?"

"Nah. Can sleep anywhere."

When they do go to sleep, she rolls to him again like she did the night before last and lays her head on his chest. She smells of peppermint and lime soap and something else…something that's just Carol.

He doesn't want to tell her it's hard for him to fall asleep like this, with another person pressed against him, with _her_ pressed against him. After all, it seems like it makes it easier for her to fall asleep. She's out in sixty seconds.

He waits ten minutes before he eases out from under her and rolls to face the dying fire. She turns also, in her sleep, on her side away from him. Almost instantly, he misses the warmth. So he slides back ever so slightly, until their backs are barely touching, and like that – with no real pressure, but just enough reassuring warmth – he drifts off to sleep.


	9. Chapter 9

"Wonder if ol' Tom fucked Sally on this kitchen table?" Daryl muses as he pours coffee from the French press into the tea cups Carol's dusted out.

"I see you've been reading the historical signs."

He sets the French press down and picks up his coffee. "Wonder if there's communities somewhere got slavery again."

"Probably. That's about how Negan ran things, wouldn't you say?" As she speaks, she's busy studying the canister of oats she just opened. She sniffs. Then she touches a few dry flakes. "I guess we'll see how this goes."

When she cooks the oatmeal, the liquid separates. She sighs. "I don't think this is going to be safe."

"Can try'n catch some more fish."

"We should get moving. Let's just have some more of those pistachios. They were good. And I've got four dried apricots left. We can have one each."

After breakfast, they pack up. Daryl claims two small souvenirs for Judith and Hershel – not from the gift shop, but from the house itself - a broach for the girl, and a coin for the boy. As they lead their horses out of the stables, Carol glances at the top of one of the wine bottles poking out of a saddle bag. "I'm afraid if we keeping splitting a bottle of wine every night, I'm going to become an alcoholic."

"Good. Then maybe the Kingdom'll finally pay a fair price for the Hilltop's moonshine."

[*]

Carol leans halfway off her horse and thrusts her knife into a walker's head. Daryl lets go of the reins to shoot another with his crossbow, loses his balance, and tumbles off the horse, smacking the asphalt hard. Grunting with pain, he rolls over and onto one knee to reload.

Carol is off her horse and on her feet. She runs for the walker that's coming toward him and sinks her knife into the side of its head. He's reloaded by the time she yanks the blade out. The walker crumples into a gruesome clump, and Daryl shoots the next one. He stands and reloads. Between them, they take down six more, and then stand back to back, circling in search of more.

"I think that's all," Carol says. She wipes her blade clean, sheaths it, and whistles to her horse, which trots up to her. Carol takes it by the reins while Daryl recovers his.

"Hope this visitor's center is worth it," he mutters. Carol wants a map of the town of Staunton, so she can find the church where her great grandfather was buried. She _claims_ the town's name is pronounced Stan-ton, but he's beginning to think she's just making up these pronunciations.

Leading their horses, they stroll down the historic Main Street and past an abandoned car where a walker thrashes weakly inside. It barely has the energy to throw itself against the window and open its jaws in desperate hunger.

They find the visitor's center – a narrow, one-room. A single walker stumbled about inside, and Daryl fells it lazily with an arrow. The creature has managed to knock over two racks of brochures during its time trapped here. There's a U-shaped counter to the right, and behind it a chair, more racks with brochures, and a glass refrigerator case full of bottled water.

Daryl vaults over the counter, opens the refrigerator, and tucks eight bottles in his backpack for the road. They won't bother to haul the rest. They both have wells at home, and they might need the saddle pack space for better things.

Daryl grabs a detailed map of Staunton and spreads it on the counter to look for the church.

"Hey," Carol says, and he looks up to find her reading a brochure. "This town has a re-creation of the Blackfriar's Playhouse in London."

"The what?"

"It was one of the theaters where Shakespeare's plays were performed. They've built a replica here."

"In _this_ town?" It just seems like a sleepy Virginia town, not a place for snooty theater goers.

"Ezekiel would have _loved_ to see it. Let's go."

The sudden reminder that Carol was married, that some other man got to know her better – or at least _differently_ – than he has – irks him more than it should. "I ain't 'Zekiel."

He must growl it – even though he doesn't mean to – because her face falls. "All right," she says cautiously. "We don't have to go."

In a softened tone, he asks, "Do _you_ wanna see it?"

She shrugs. "I don't need to. It just sounds interesting. I've never been to London. Never been anywhere, really."

"Guess we could…swing by. Hell, might be somethin' to loot."

[*]

Carol stands on the center of the stage of the Blackfriar's Playhouse and projects to an audience of one, "To be or not to be, that is the question."

From where he sits slouched in a seat in the front row, Daryl claps.

Carol comes down from the stage and sets a prop crown on his head.

"Stahp," he complains, and swipes it off.

"You'd make a good King Richard II," she tells him.

"The evil, gay one?"

"He's wasn't _evil_. Just _conflicted_. But, fine, Henry V."

"A'ight. He kicked ass. And got plenty of ass, too."

She leans back against the stage. "I didn't know you knew your Shakespeare so well."

"Used to watch VHS movies in detention. The teacher supervisin' put 'em on. Always Shakespeare. Think he was tryin' to torture us."

"What did you get detention for?" she asks. "Smoking in the boys' room?"

"Nah. Hell, we had a student smokin' lounge. Got in trouble for fights mostly."

"What were the fights about?"

He shrugs. "Different shit. One day a guy called me a white trash piece of shit. So I had to hit 'em. Another day a guy got up in my face for lookin' his girl all over."

" _Were_ you looking his girl all over?"

"Nah. Just 'er tits."

Carol snorts. "Did you finish high school?"

"Yeah, believe it or not. Did the vocational track. Slept through my regular classes, barely passed 'em, but got to leave school early m' last two years to work in a bike shop. Never did become a mechanic, though."

"Well, I dropped out."

"To support yer mom?" he asks. "'Cause she got sick?"

She seems surprised he remembers that detail. "And myself. She had a stroke. And then she had dementia from the stroke. She couldn't work anymore. She could barely take care of herself. I couldn't afford someone to watch her, so I'd just…try to make the house safe. Leave her meals in the fridge." Carol hugs herself. "One day, when I was nineteen, I came home, and she thought I was a robber. She hit me in the face with a lamp. I had to get twelve stitches."

"Jesus," Daryl mutters.

Carol looks at him sympathetically and a little cautiously. "At least she didn't do it on purpose."

"'Least I could just walk away when I's old enough. Ya must of felt…dunno."

"Obligated," she says. "I did. I felt obligated to stay and take care of her, and I _was_ obligated. She'd always taken such good care of me. I loved her. And having to see her like that…" Carol shakes her head. She blinks back tears. "Funny, everything I've gone through in my life, and everything since the Turn, and thinking of that…how can _that_ still hurt?"

The chair squeaks as Daryl stands. It flaps back up into place. "Hey," he murmurs. "C'mere." When she takes two steps toward him, he draws her in for a hug.

She rests her head against his shoulder for a moment before she pulls away, swipes at her eyes, and says, "Let's go check out that concession stand."

[*]

The concession stand yields only decayed candy, flat soda, and molded chips, but Carol's determined. She busts open a supply cabinet beneath the counter, while Daryl stands silently reading the Shakespearian sonnet etched in fading black cursive on the opposite wall:

 _Let me not to the marriage of true minds  
_ _Admit impediments. Love is not love  
_ _Which alters when it alteration finds,  
_ _Or bends with the remover to remove._

For some reason, when he reads those words, he can't help but think of Carol being banished from the prison, and then coming back to save them all from Terminus, even though they didn't deserve her loyalty. He can't help but think of her leaving Alexandria and marrying Ezekiel, and how much that hurt, and yet how ready he still is to follow her three hundred miles and back.

 _O no! it is an ever-fixed mark –  
_ _That looks on tempests and is never shaken;  
_ _It is the star to every wand'ring bark,  
_ _Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.  
_ _Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks  
_ _Within his bending sickle's compass come;  
_ _Love alters not -_

Carol shouts his name – squeals it almost - and Daryl turns suddenly from the sonnet. She stands up from her crouched position and thrusts a large plastic bag victoriously into the air above her head. It's filled with the mother of all apocalyptic candies.

"Holy shit," Daryl mutters. "That what I think it is?"

"Giant pixie sticks!" she exclaims. "Pure sugar. And still sealed. There's an 80% chance it's just fine."

They leave the theater and ride toward the church where Carol's ancestor is supposedly buried. They ride side by side, each throwing back a huge plastic straw full of delicious dust, with twenty-six more sticks snuggled in one of the saddle bags.

"Trade flavors?" Carol asks, and he can't possibly say no, even though she's swallowed more than half of hers, and he's only had a third.


	10. Chapter 10

Black rust cakes the bronze bell of the old Episcopalian church, freezing it in a half-rung position. The once white paint of the rain-battered steeple has peeled away to expose a gray-brown underbelly. The wood threatens to split, and yet the tower holds. A bird has made its nest above the bell and chirps loudly to its offspring. Daryl looks away when Carol calls to him: "The cemetery is here!"

He joins her at the left side of the church and sees the old gray stones and dirt-streaked crosses rising above the rocky dirt, which sprouts only the occasional dark green weed here or there. They walk among the dead, a foot apart, trying to make out the names etched on the memorials. Here and there Carol crouches and rubs away the grime of years to try to read what lies beneath. Among these old-timey names, they find an Abraham, a Theodore, a Margaret, a Noah, _and_ a Richard.

Daryl watches Carol out of the corner of his eye as she swallows at the roll call of the dead. "I'll go to the back," she says softly. "You keep looking toward the front. We'll make this quick."

They split ways and Daryl reads the names until his feet still before a flat memorial stone. Peeking out mockingly from the dirt are the letters that spell Sophia. His heart catches, and he looks up anxiously to see how far away Carol is.

She stands before a stone angel. "Did you find it?" she calls.

"Nah!" He walks hurriedly away, his eyes on the stones. At last, he spies it. _Mercer_. Daryl unsheathes his knife, crouches, and then, holding the blade flat, uses it to scrape off a coat of dried mud to reveal the names George Aaron. "Found it!" he shouts, and Carol hastens over.

He finishes cleaning off the stone for her, until they can make it out fully:

 _Fr. George Aaron Mercer  
_ _beloved husband and father  
_ _friend of God  
_ _1892 - 1925_

"Father? Yer great granddaddy was a priest?" Daryl asks.

She laughs. "I guess so. An Episcopal one, I suppose. Since he had a wife and kids. And he's buried here." Her eyes rake over the stone. "He sure died young. 33."

"Same as Jesus." Her brow knits in confusion, and he realizes she thinks he's talking about Hilltop's Jesus. "Christ."

"Yeah." She runs her fingertips over the lettering on the upright, misshapen stone, "I can't take this with me, like I did that page from the book, but thank you. Thank you for indulging me."

Daryl swings his backpack off his shoulder. " _Can_ bring it with ya."

"What? No. We're not defacing a grave and hauling a heavy tombstone."

He digs in his pack to draw out two sheets of legal-size paper. He often carries paper for making maps when he discovers good hunting grounds or walker-infested areas to be avoided.

She takes the paper when he hands it to her, but looks puzzled.

"Hold on." He unzips the front pouch and draws out a pack of colored chalk he picked up from the elementary school to bring back to the Hilltop's one-room school house. He opens it and slides out a dark purple stick. "'Member doin' this as a kid?"

"A grave rubbing?" she asks, and the way her eyes light up with excitement make his heart beat a little faster.

They kneel together before the grave. Daryl holds the two sheets together on the upright stone while Carol leans forward to start rubbing with the colored chalk. It's too light at first, so she rubs harder, and he has to force himself not to look down at her breasts as they bounce lightly with her vigorous effort, but his eyes do flit down once. Or twice.

A gust of wind rustles the corners of the paper, and Carol has to pause in her efforts until the flapping stills. Above, the clouds are graying. The horses whinny impatiently where they were left tied to a parking meter in front of the church, and Daryl glances back to make sure they aren't warning of approaching walkers on the street, but they only seem bothered by the sudden drop in temperature and the unexpected gale. "Storm's comin'. Better make this quick."

Carol starts rubbing again. Daryl has to move his hands around to accommodate her, and it gets to be a bit like a game of Twister, with her leaning around his arms to keep rubbing. She breathes a little harder as she throws her elbows into the work. His eyes flit to her chest again, for just a moment, and it feels wrong, so very wrong, to be thinking about sex in a graveyard.

He's relieved when she's done and falls back on her bottom in the dirt, rests her elbows on her drawn up knees, and surveys her handiwork. "Shoot," she mutters. "I missed the last line."

She's getting ready to kneel again when there's a growl from her right. Daryl checked the street, but he didn't check the back of the church.

Carol scurries to her feet, drops the chalk, and draws her knife. Daryl holds the paper in place with one hand while seizing the rolling chalk in the other.

"Forget it!" she shouts as she strides forward several feet and sinks her knife into the head of an approaching walker, but Daryl continues the rubbing.

Carol yanks her knife out, runs forward, and stabs a second walker. Now finished with the rubbing, Daryl drops the paper and chalk, stands, swivels his bow off his shoulder, and shoots a third walker stumbling from behind the church and toward the graveyard. As he reloads, Carol runs forward with her bloody knife, but she stops suddenly.

She turns and runs back, flying past him while shouting, "Let's go! Let's go!"

Daryl looks up from his freshly loaded bow to see a small herd of walkers streaming from around the edge of the church toward them. They must have been bumbling around _inside_ the church and spilled out an open back doorway in response to the sound of the horses and human voices.

An arrow whizes from Daryl's crossbow and thunks into the closet walker, which slumps to the ground as Daryl swings his backpack on. The two sheets of paper are caught up in the wind and drift toward the herd. He chases after the floating papers, dodging first one walker and then another. He seizes one sheet in mid-air and scoops the other from the ground. His hands full with the papers, he has to kick back a walker before running for the horses.

Carol has untied them both and it mounting hers. Daryl shoves the papers in his mouth and holds them between his pressed lips to free his hands to vault himself up on the animal.

Carol draws her side arm and shoots the walker that is now reaching for the tail of Daryl's horse. It's the first bullet they've used on their journey. She yells a hi-ya to her horse and spurs it down the street. With a rough kick to the animal's side, Daryl thunders after her.

[*]

When they've put a mile between themselves and the herd, they slow the horses to a walk. Daryl still holds the papers in his mouth. He yanks back on the reins to stop his horse and then take the papers out. "Sorry I slobbered all over your grave rubbin'."

"You didn't have to risk your _life_ for it, you know."

"Pfft. Didn't. Had plenty of time." He slides off his horse and brings the rubbing over to Carol, who has stilled her mare.

"Thank you," she says as he folds the paper and slides it into the saddle bag with the pixie sticks and medicines.

Thunder rumbles across the darkening sky.

"Need to put some more distance 'tween us 'n that herd," Daryl says, "'n find shelter."

They veer off down a windy country road, because the herd has lost their scent by now and will likely just keep going straight. Unfortunately, there isn't much in the way of houses, but at last Carol spies a farm and points to it just as thunder booms across the sky.

The clouds open to pour down a torrent of rain. Carol flips up the hood on her light jacket, but Daryl doesn't have one, and together they ride toward the farm house, through tall wet grasses.

When they're two yards from the house, a mighty crack echoes across the field, and an immense tree plummets onto the farmhouse, bringing the roof down with it. "Shit!" Daryl mutters as the horses rear back.

"There's a barn!" Carol's yells. Daryl can barely hear her over the howling wind and wooshing rain. They ride quickly for the shelter, and when they dismount inside, and slide shut and secure the flapping door with the iron hook lock, they're soaked to the bone.

A stream of water pours down from one section of the barn's worn roof, pitter-pattering into a muddy puddle on the dirt ground, but otherwise the place seems secure.

They stable the horses in stalls as far away from the leak as possible, unburden the animals from their saddle bags, wipe them down, and leave them pans of water.

"Gonna clear the loft," Daryl says.

"I'm going to change out of these wet clothes. No peeking."

"Pffft."

But he does peek, over the rail of the loft, when he sees there's nothing up there but some aged, brittle, and crumbling straw. When he glances over the rail, he catches a flash of her bare breasts just as she lowers over them a dark green sweatshirt with a picture of Monticello on it. He turns at the sound of scurrying and shoots a squirrel. Two more disappear beneath the planks.

"Walker?" Carol calls up.

"Nah. Dinner."

When Daryl comes back down, she hands him a pair of sweat pants and a sweatshirt from the giftshop at Monticello. "I snagged some for you, too, so you don't have to sleep in your work pants anymore."

"Like sleepin' 'n my work pants. What if I got to get up 'n fight?"

"Then you can fight in comfy pants."

He doesn't argue. He's cold and wet and the temperature must have dropped another ten degrees with this rain. It feels more like late winter than early spring. Some soft, dry sweats sound pretty good right about now.

He turns his back to her while he changes and has a sense that she's watching him, but when he turns around again, she's busying herself with the horses.

"How long do you think this storm will last?"

"While," he mutters. "'N by then the sun'll've set. Might as well camp here. Caught a squirrel for super." He nods to the animal he's left on the ground by his abandoned pack.

"Do you think there's enough ventilation to light a fire in here?"

All these walkers in the world, and yet most of them who have made it this long will likely die from smoke pollution.

"'S a damn hole in the roof."

"True enough. But we best not burn it long."

Daryl's not sure how Carol seasons the squirrel, but it tastes better than the bland stuff he ate over his campfire in the woods for years. She remembered to snag a corkscrew from the winery, but they have no crystal glasses, so tonight they just pass a bottle of wine back and forth beside the fire, while the barn creaks from the wind, rain batters the wood, thunder rumbles, the horses huff, and brief flashes of lightening illuminate the barn through an upper window like a strobe.

"I think I'm getting a buzz," Carol observes.

"Well, we ain't ate much today."

Carol doesn't say anything more as they drink, but that doesn't bother him. When the bottle is drained, he dampens the fire. Carol lights an oil lamp and sets it near her. She sits Indian style on her unzipped sleeping bag – his is still rolled - and by the low light of the wick smooths out the rubbing and tapes the two papers together in back with medical tape. She flips them over and studies the final product.

Daryl's sits on his bedroll sharpening one of his knives. The light of the oil lamp paints shadows on the soft skin of Carol's face, and for a brief moment, it illuminates the tears glistening inside the light blue pools of her eyes. "Hell's the matter?" he asks with alarm.

"I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm so emotional looking at this."

He doesn't know either. It's just the rubbing from the grave of some long dead ancestor, someone she never met in her life, in a state she never even went to before the Turn. "Ya didn't even know 'em."

"I'm not crying because of _him_." She swipes at the tears in the corner of her eyes.

"'N why?" Daryl runs his sharpening stone up his blade, and then back.

"I think I'm crying because you're so good to me."

Daryl's hand freezes for a moment on the sharpening stone.

She smiles gently and folds up the rubbing where it's taped. "You're such an idiot. You ran _toward_ the herd to get this for me. Because you thought it was important to me."

He tosses the stone back into his open backpack. "It ain't?"

"Certainly not as important as you."

Daryl slowly sheaths his knife and lays it aside on the ground. His chest tightens, and he tries to think what to say to that, how to interpret it, how to feel about it, but he already feels _something_. It's not the first time she's said something like that. Even as far back as the farm, she told him, _I can't lose you, too_. But there's something different in the way she says it tonight.

She uncrosses her legs, puts her feet flat on her stretched out sleeping bag, and hugs her knees while looking at him over the ashes of the dead fire. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Mhmhm."

"Why did you kiss me the other night?"


	11. Chapter 11

_Why did you kiss me the other night?_ The question echoes in Daryl's brain. How is he supposed to answer that question now? He did it because he wanted to. Because he _needed_ to. "Dunno."

"You don't know _why_ you kissed me?"

"Dunno," he repeats in a mutter, and suddenly busies himself with a loose thread at the hem of the sweatpants she picked up for him. He twirls the black thread around his finger.

Carol sighs. "I'm just…confused."

 _She's_ confused?

"Because…Daryl…you haven't made a move since."

The thread snaps off. She _wanted_ him to make another move? "Did…" he looks up hesitantly. "Did ya like it?"

"I kissed you back, didn't I?"

He chews on his bottom lip. "Yeah. Just didn't know if…if ya meant to."

She lets out an exasperated chuckle. "Well, I did. Did _you_ mean to?"

The broken-off thread around his finger has cut off the circulation. Concentrating fiercely on the task, he unravels the thread. "Yeah."

"Why?"

"Just…needed to, I guess. Felt like…I needed to."

"I think we're both afraid of losing this," she says quietly. "Whatever this is that we have."

Muscles he didn't even know were tense unwind like the thread he's just spun off his finger. He's relieved because she put this feeling into words. He catches her eyes. "Yeah."

"I know you care for me, Daryl. I know by the way you treat me. I just don't know…I don't know what you want this to be. What do you want here?"

"Want you," he blurts, and then his voice and eyes fall. "Just want you."

" _How_? How do you want me?"

"Anyway y'll let me have ya," he admits.

"Well, I want to be more than friends."

Daryl's thumbnail flies into his mouth and he chews nervously. When people say they're _more than friends_ , that usually means they're fucking. Except…Daryl's never fucked a friend. He's only ever fucked strangers. He never even _had_ a friend until Carol, not really. She was his very first friend in the world. And he thinks maybe she'll be his last, if he doesn't screw _more-than-friends_ up. "A'ight."

"All right?" She laughs. "Well, it's all right with me, too."

He lowers his hand from his mouth and picks at the hangnail. "This mean we're havin' sex?"

He can feel her reaction more than he can see it. The breath seems to go out of her, and he wishes he hadn't said it, thinks maybe he's _already_ screwed _more-than-friends_ up.

"Sure," she replies quietly.

"Ain't got to!" He already knows she doesn't think much of her past sexual experiences. The last thing he wants is for her to do it out of obligation, because she thinks she has to, in order to be _more than friends_. "Ain't got to."

"I know I don't have to. But I want to. _Eventually_. Just maybe…not tonight. We've only kissed the _once_."

"Yeah." He digs at the hangnail until it drips a small drop of blood as red as his face must be. "'Course." What a stupid thing to suggest. This is _Carol_. Not some woman he picked up in a bar. They haven't even gone on a date yet. Unless that's what this whole trip has been. "We…are we datin'?" He peers up enough to see her smile.

"We're having a good time," she says. "I think. Aren't we?"

He smiles at her smile. "Yeah."

"Would you like to kiss me again?"

"Mhmm," he says, but he's frozen in place.

"You should probably come over here first. It would be a long stretch otherwise."

Daryl stands up from his rolled sleeping bag and walks around the dead fire. She moves the oil lamp to the other side of herself so he can sit down on her unzipped sleeping bag next to her, which he does. She scoots a little closer to him. They turn their faces to one another. Heart thudding, he leans in, but she leans in at the same time. Their noses and foreheads bump, hard.

"Ow!" Carol draws back.

"Sorry," he mutters.

She chuckles and turns toward him again. His hair is shorter now than it was a few years ago, but there's still enough in front that she can brush back a strand from his forehead, which she does before running her fingertips down his cheek. Her gentle caress leaves a trail of heat in its wake. This time, he lets her lean in while he stays still.

She presses her lips shyly against the corner of his mouth, and then all the way across his closed lips. He opens his mouth slightly, puts a hand at the back of her head and presses her in.

The kiss begins slowly and gently, but soon deepens. He's startled by how much it excites him. He's usually avoided kissing women. It's too intimate. He's certainly never been turned on by a simple kiss before. But after a little while tasting Carol, he's already halfway to a full-on hard-on.

Is this what the kids in high school meant when they said they were _making out_? He never understood why anyone would want to do that. It seemed like a waste of time. It wasn't fucking, after all. But he's starting to understand it now.

Carol hums against his lips. He's pretty sure that means she likes the kissing. She puts a hand on the back of his head, which lifts her arm so that his hand can slide down her back and around to the front. He lays his palm flat against the side of her breast. She leans into his hand, or at least he thinks she does, and now he's all the way to a full-on hard on. Just from _kissing_. He hopes she doesn't stop kissing him and look down.

He's about to shift his hand, to attempt sliding his thumb over her nipple through her soft sweatshirt, to see if she's as hard as he is, when a portion of the roof gives way.

Decayed wood splinters off while rainwater sloshes down in a waterfall and turns the puddle into a growing pond. Mist from the pouring waterfall floats outward and coats their skin and clothes in a thin layer.

"Shit!" Daryl scrambles to his feet and snatches up the oil lamp.

Carol stands and picks up her sleeping bag to draw it away from the rippling edges of the growing pool. She grabs her pack and hastens to the other side of the dying fire, where Daryl picks up his pack and kicks his rolled sleeping bag down the dirt floor of the barn almost to the door.

Standing by the horses now, they look up as the waterfall finishes its sloshing decent into the sea of mud and broken roofing. Now its just rain pattering in through the large, misshapen hole in the roof.

Carol calms the startled horses with gentle petting and clicking.

"This ain't good," Daryl says, although at least his painful hard-on has faded away.

"Astute observation, Sherlock."

"Go out there, though, we'd just be in it."

"It would be hard to see walkers in the dark, and even harder in the rain," she agrees as she steps away from Freckles, whom she's just stroked into settling.

"Ain't likely to find shelter for miles. Farm truck maybe. Probably pick-ups out there."

"We have to think about the horses. Hopefully the rest of the roof will hold." She looks up. "This part seems sturdier. No drips even."

Daryl raises the oil lamp to illuminate the pool on the ground.

"I don't think that will grow _all the way_ over here tonight," Carol says.

"A'ight. But one of us better stand watch. If more collapses down there," he points toward the widened hole in the roof, "we gotta leave 'fore it all collapses 'n falls on us."

"Sounds like a plan."

"Ya sleep first," he insists.

"Why me?" Carol asks.

"'Cause yer buzzed, and I ain't."

She chuckles. "What makes you think I'm buzzed?"

"One, ya said ya were. 'N two," The left side of his mouth twitches. "Ya wanted to make out with me."

"Well, I won't drink any wine tomorrow night so you can see I don't have to be buzzed to do that."

They're making out tomorrow night, too? Of course they are. That's what _more-than-friends_ do, he reckons. They make out every night they're together. Well, maybe not _every_ night. But a _lot_ of nights, probably, he thinks. Glenn and Maggie sure made out a lot of nights. He could hear them going at it in their cell. Once he had to shout for them to keep it down.

Carol stands on her tiptoes and kisses his forehead. "Thanks for keeping watch," she says before zipping up her sleeping bag to settle inside it for the night.

Daryl puts his rolled up sleeping bag not far from her and sits on the lump with his elbows on his knees and the oil lamp to his left. He watches the falling rain collecting in the deepening, widening pool. The pool grows slowly, forming mud at its outer edges like a rim, and when he's content it's not going to widen its way out to them, he takes a knife from his pack and begins to clean it.

He doesn't sharpen it, because Carol has already faded into sleep, the pattering rain like a lullaby. But the sound of a blade against stone is less soothing, and it will likely wake her.

He glances at her curled in the sleeping bag, her chest gently rising and falling, and hopes he doesn't fuck this up, this _more-than-friends_ thing.

His horse snorts, almost like its laughing at him, and Daryl mutters, "Shut the hell up, Freckles."


	12. Chapter 12

Daryl nudges Carol awake around four in the morning, when the rain has softened to a gentle patter. He sleeps until the sun streams through the hole in the roof. Carol has lit a fire and is making coffee. "I'm nearing the last of my beans," she tells him as he pulls himself up. "We'll have to use your instant stuff in a couple of days."

He rises and checks if the wet clothes they draped over one of the stall doors are dry. His eyes fall on Carol's black bra hanging over her pants. A lacy trim lines the cups, and his first thought is – who the hell is she wearing _that_ for? And then with a sudden tingling of his nerves, he wonders if it was for _him_.

Then he sees the plain white cotton panties that don't match, and he realizes it was probably just a bra she found that fit. Besides, she doesn't want sex. Not yet. Just _eventually_. He wonders when _eventually_ will be. He hopes it's soon. Or maybe not. He needs to work up some endurance with this kissing. Maybe if he can get used to staying hard without satisfaction, he won't cum like a jack rabbit the first time they do it.

"They're still very wet," she says. "But you can wear the pair of pants I patched yesterday morning. Do you have a spare long-sleeve shirt?"

"Gotta dry undershirt." He gets a muscle shirt out of his backpack. It's mostly white, except for some permanent, light black stains.

"You could keep wearing that sweatshirt."

"Nah." He yanks the sweatshirt over his head. "Be fine." He slides the worn muscle shirt on. "Get hot when I ride anyhow."

He turns to see her looking him over, her eyes running from his half-bare shoulders and down his arms. Has she ever done that before? Looked at him like _that_? Like he's some kind of candy she wants to lick up? If she _has_ , he sure as hell hasn't noticed.

She doesn't do it for long. Her eyes are back on the French press now as she pushes down the top. "You should have woken me up sooner. You only got three hours of sleep to my five."

"'M fine." He crouches down to draw his pants out of his backpack. Carol's already dressed, with a long-sleeve checkered flannel shirt open over her white tank top and a pair of tan cargo pants he hasn't seen her wear yet. How does she fit all those clothes in her pack?

He turns his back to her and drops his sweat pants.

"You really do _go_ commando," she says.

He flushes. "Stahp." He wants to look over his shoulder to see if she's checking him out, but he knows that will just make him turn more red. God knows he'd be looking at her ass, if he had a chance.

As he yanks on his Wranglers, she asks, "Isn't that uncomfortable, no boxers, in rough pants like that?"

"Nah."

"I'd hate it."

He yanks his zipper up and turns around as he finishes buttoning. By the time he's put on his belt and knives and holster with handgun, she's pouring the coffee.

He sits beside her on her rolled-up sleeping bag before a campfire. She has a map spread open at her feet. "Gotta route planned?" he asks as she hands him a tin cup of coffee.

"We went out of the way to see that grave. I originally thought we'd backtrack and then continue south east through Richmond to Jamestown, but I'm not sure we should head back toward that herd in Staunton. It may be growing." She draws her finger down on the map. "We could go straight south from here down to Lynchburg and then east over to Jamestown. But that would add an extra day or two to our trip."

'S do it."

"Yeah? You don't mind spending the extra time with me, huh?" His lips are twitching into a bashful smile when her next words freeze them. "Don't mind stretching this a couple of days?"

 _Stretching this a couple days?_ This "more than friends" thing, is it just for _this trip_?

When they go back…and she goes back to ruling her Kingdom, and he goes back to hunting for the Hilltop…do they go back to just being friends?

"Something wrong?" she asks.

He sips slowly, lowers the tin cup between his hands, and lets the heat sear his palms. He's not sure he wants to know the answer to his question. "Nah. Coffee's just too hot."

"Well blow on it, silly."

[*]

They ride up hilly, windy, two-lane mountain roads through acres and acres of forest where the live oak trees are draped in vibrant green leaves. The Dogwoods have just begun to bud. In a month they'll flower and coat the hills with pollen, but for now the air is fresh, without even the stench of walkers. The breeze is sweet with the scent of early spring, of after-rain, and the birds sing mating songs from tree to tree, filling the air with a symphony of chirping.

"I bet this is gorgeous in the fall," Carol says as she steers her horse a little closer to his.

"Mhmhm."

She says something else, but Daryl's not really listening. He's wondering if this thing they're doing is like one of those summer camp flings the kids at his junior high school used to talk about.

He had to ride the bus five miles to that school, but those middle-class boys lived in the neighborhood. They would go to summer camp and sleep in cabins with no air conditioning or electricity, fish and swim and hike like it was some kind of adventure vacation. They'd earn badges for learning archery, or whittling, for shooting BB guns or tying knots. At night, or so they claimed, they would sneak out and meet up with girls from the girls' camp and make out in the woods. To Daryl, all that was simply everyday life, except for the making out with girls part. And there were no counselors for him to answer to. The one man he _did_ have to answer to gave him bruises instead of badges.

"…you think?" Carol asks.

"Hmmm?"

"Should we?"

"Should we what?"

She points to the road sign that indicates the direction of a ski resort. "Make camp?"

"We ain't gone that far today. Barely thirty miles."

"But it's a _resort_." She smiles teasingly. "It could be _romantic_."

"Pfft." But if Carol _does_ think it's romantic, then it might be a place she wants to make out for a long time. Besides, they should rest the horses. They rode the things hard yesterday. "A'ight."

He steers his horse toward the dirt road winding up toward the resort, and Carol follows.

[*]

"This is gorgeous." Carol stands on the deck of the lodge overlooking the mountains. The rusted swings of the distant ski lift seem frozen in place, while a few stray walkers roam the overgrown, snowless slopes. The horses are stabled downstairs in the basement game room, where there's a sliding glass door they blocked with furniture, in case any walkers wend their way to it. But then they came up to the lobby, cleared the rest of the lodge, dumped their gear, and then came out on this deck.

Daryl lowers his binoculars. He doesn't see more than eight walkers out there, and they're a long ways off. He can pick them off if they get too close to the lodge, but the creatures can't smell them from there.

"I always wanted to go skiing as a little girl," Carol says. "I begged my mother to take us for winter break, but she always said we couldn't afford it."

"Ain't no slopes in Georgia."

"I wanted to go to Gatlinburg. Tennessee. It was only a four-hour drive. But we never even drove out of Georgia. Of course, our car never could go more than a hundred miles straight without the engine smoking." She turns from the rail. "I'm hungry."

Daryl takes the hint and goes hunting. He kills three walkers while he's out there, and his boots get wet in a creek, but he comes back with a sizable rabbit. He leaves his boots and socks to dry by the fire, where Carol sets a pot of rabbit stew boiling, and he follows her barefoot back out onto the deck to watch the sun set over the mountains. The wooden planks are still slightly warm from the afternoon sun, though the air has cooled to about fifty degrees, and the tops of his bare toes are cold.

"I see why they call it the Blue Ridge now," Carol says.

The caps of the hills have grown a purple-blue beneath the red-orange glow of the sinking sun. Carol snakes her arm around his waist and rests her head on his shoulder until the last of the light slips below the horizon.

Daryl's stomach growls, and she laughs and takes his hand and draws him inside.

They sit at a wooden table in the rustic lobby of the lodge, not too far from the fireplace, and eat by the flickering light of the flames.

"I found some wild onions outside while you were gone," Carol says. "Put them in here along with that basil from the café and a few other spices. Do you like it?"

"Mhmh. Good."

"We can sleep on that bearskin rug tonight, in front of the fireplace. It looks comfy."

"Mhmh."

"We might want to put a sleeping bag down over it, though. It's a bit dusty."

"Mhmhm."

"Penny for your thoughts? You've been quiet all day."

"'M always quiet." He lifts his bowl, tilts it to his mouth, and drinks the last of the broth down.

"True enough."

Daryl sets his bowl on the table and looks at the line of broth still clinging to the rim. He runs a finger around it and then sucks the residue off his fingertip. When he looks up, she's watching him.

"You seem worried about something, though," she says, "Care to share?"

His eyes flit back into his bowl. Maybe it's better he knows, even if he doesn't want to know. "Just wonderin' somethin'."

"What's that?"

"How long's this s'posed to last?"

"Well, about nine or ten more days I suppose."

His gut sinks. "Oh."

"Why? Do you want it to last longer?"

He looks up from the bowl. "Well….yeah. Mean. Wouldn't mind."

"You're not worried about having time to hunt before the winter?"

He draws his canteen toward himself. "Wouldn't really take up that much more time than bein' friends, would it? Mean, we'd just be doin' diff'rn stuff, right?"

Carol's looking at him like he's speaking Greek. "I'm talking about how many more days this trip will take. What are _you_ talking about?"

He flushes.

"Daryl?"

He stands and pads over in his bare feet, picks up the poker, and stokes the fire.

"Daryl? What were _you_ talking about?"

"How much longer ya wanna be more 'n friends," he mutters.

She laughs that laugh she laughs when he's done something stupid and he doesn't know what the stupid thing is. Her voice is happy and affectionate. "Pookie, there's no expiration date on it. Did you think I wanted a short fling?"

"Dunno." He slides the fire poker back in its stand, turns to look at her, and sees her face has grown suddenly worried.

"Is that what _you_ want?" she asks.

"Hell no. Less'n 's what _you_ want. Mean…still aint' what I want. But I'll take it."

"I don't want a fling, Daryl. I don't know exactly where we're going to go from here, or how we're going to get there, or how long it's going to take, but I know I don't want to go _backward_."

Daryl sighs in relief. Carol stands, comes over to him by the fire, and puts her hands on his hips. She presses her forehead to his. "If I just wanted a fling, we'd be moving faster. But I want us to take our time."

"A'ight."

She tilts her chin up to kiss his forehead. He leans into the feel of her lips. Of all her little kisses, he thinks he loves this one most, maybe because it was the first way she ever kissed him.

Carol steps back. "Is it? All right? If we take things slowly?"

"Yeah. 'Course." He chews on his bottom lip and hopes it's not a bad move to ask for clarification. "Does that mean we ain't havin' sex?"

She smiles. "We're going to have sex. _Eventually_. Just…maybe not right away."

He wants to know when eventually is, a ballpark time frame at least, but he doesn't ask. He just nods. "A'ight. But…uh…we gonna make out tonight?"

Her eyes smile, and she nods.

"Want me to open some wine?" he offers. That might loosen her up a little, like it did last night.

"I don't need wine, Pookie." She turns and walks over to her backpack, which she lifts up onto an armchair near the fireplace. "Why don't we brush teeth, get in our sweats, and make up our bed? And then we'll see where the night takes us?"

Excitement and anxiety fire his nerves. "Mhmhm." He lifts his pack into another chair to unzip it and begins to prepare for bed.


	13. Chapter 13

The making out is going well. Daryl thinks so anyway.

They're sitting on top of a sleeping bag spread out over the bear skin rug. At least, Daryl is. Carol sits sideways on his lap, her thin white tank top clinging tightly to her breasts while her fingertips toy with his left ear. The fire warms the arm he's wrapped around her waist to steady her, but it's her kisses that warm his face.

She did this thing a minute ago where she raked her teeth gently over his earlobe, and it made him moan, which was damn embarrassing, because he doesn't make sounds like that. Usually.

He's got a hard-on again. It's tenting his soft sweatpants like a damn pole, and he's afraid if she shifts just slightly on his lap. She's going to feel it and want to stop.

She's back on his lips now. They kiss for a long time, and still it doesn't seem like enough. He thrusts his tongue into her mouth for a moment, and then back out. He buries his hand in her hair to push her deeper into another kiss.

Carol suddenly pulls away.

"Sorry," he mutters. He's never kissed on a girl like this before – for this long, this many times in a row, this deeply. There was never much making out before the fucking when it came to the kind of women he picked up (or that, more often, Merle picked up for him). What little kissing there was he pulled away from as quickly as he could, so he could get to the less personal fucking. It certainly never excited him, not the way kissing Carol does. He has no idea what he's doing, and he thinks she pulled away because it wasn't good. "I can try n' fix it."

"Fix what?"

"The kissin'. Could learn."

She smiles. "There's nothing to fix. I just needed some air."

"Ya'd tell me though? If there was?" He doesn't want to be another one of her mediocre experiences. "Look, Carol…don't want ya pretendin' to like shit ya don't. Not with me. Ya want me to do somethin' diff'rn, just _tell_ me."

In the light glow of the fireplace, her face grows pink. "I like the way you suck your fingers."

Lines of confusion crinkle Daryl's brow. "What?"

"When you get food on them. The way you suck them, it's…I don't know. It turns me on a little."

What? _That_ turns her on? He thought she was always looking at him when he did that because she thought it was disgusting. "I…ya want me to suck my fingers?" He'll do just about anything for her, but that's ridiculous. He'd feel like a damn fool, sucking his own fingers without a reason. " _Now_?"

She laughs. "No. I want you to maybe…" She trails off.

"Maybe what?"

Carol picks at a loose thread on his muscle shirt, near his shoulder. "Suck my tongue like that. When we're kissing. I mean, not too hard, and not the entire time, just - "

Daryl moves in and silences her with his mouth.

He's guessing she likes it because she gasps a few times between tongue-sucking kisses and starts to squirm on his lap. When she shifts, she hits his erection with her ass, and he freezes. "Sorry," he mutters. "Know we're just kissin'. Dunno why it's doin' that."

Carol laughs. "Well, I think maybe it likes me." Daryl flushes, and she shifts herself so that she's straddling his lap with her knees on the sleeping bag. It's torture, having his erection pressed right up against her like that. She pushes his shoulder, like she wants him to lie down on his back, so he does.

Her blue eyes flash in the firelight as she puts her palms down flat on either side of his shoulders and bends to kiss him, her lower body still pressed torturously to his. He tries sucking her tongue again, and she must really like it, because she starts rubbing her lower half against his, riding his erection through their sweat pants.

She rubs slowly at first, but then harder and faster while their lips smack and their tongues tangle. Going commando seems like an especially good choice to him now. "Damn," he hisses between kisses.

He thinks it might kill him, the way she's dry humping him like a teenage girl in the backseat of her boyfriend's first car. Through her tank top, he touches a breast, and he can feel her nipple erect against the fabric. She kisses him harder and humps faster, whimpering against his lips. Daryl snakes a hand underneath the shirt and cups her bare breast. He squeezes gently, and then slides his calloused thumb over her hardened nipple. Carol suddenly freezes.

 _Shit._ Maybe he shouldn't have done that. Maybe he should have asked before going under her shirt.

He's about to apologize when she says, "Oh" like she's surprised. But then her oh becomes an " _Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh_!" and she shivers before collapsing on him. She slides half off of him and buries her face in the crook of his neck.

Did she just cum?

He's pretty sure she did.

It wasn't loud, and it wasn't hard, but it was definitely an orgasm of some kind - and one she didn't seem to be expecting. "Ya a'ight?" he asks.

"Mhmhm." She shivers a little more, cuddles in, and lodges one of her legs between both his.

Goddamn but his balls hurt. And his dick is still at full attention. He wants to ask her to give him some relief, but he also doesn't want her to think that he expects her to just do things for him and pretend to like it. He thinks maybe he's just going to have to ride this one out, just let her be the one to feel good this time, so she doesn't feel pressure and isn't shy about asking for what she wants. "Ya feel good?" he asks.

"I didn't know…" She raises her face from its hiding spot and kisses his cheek. Her breath is warm in his ear. "I didn't know that could happen just by doing that. I mean, that's just as good as the best one. And we weren't even…you know."

Just as good as the _best one_? He's not exactly a skilled lover, but he's made women cum before. They _screamed_. He's pretty sure that the little pop and shiver she just experienced is far from the _best one_. "'S gonna be better 'n that when we…ya know. Should be. Better."

She kisses his cheek again. "The fire's going to die later. Will you get your sleeping bag for a cover?"

"Mhmh." He tries to ignore his aching hard-on while he sits up and reaches for the other sleeping bag. He supposes this signals the end of the make-out session, and now they're going to sleep. He's still hard when he unzips the bag and drapes it over them. He lies down on his back, wondering how long this painful erection is going to last, and if he can discretely take care of it after she falls asleep.

Carol puts her head on his shoulder and her hand on his bare abdomen where his t-shirt has ridden up. But then her hand shifts. Down. Under the waistband of his sweat pants.

He hisses in surprised pleasure when she grasps him, and shudders when she circles the tip with her thumb and spreads the pre-crum up his shaft. But it's when she starts to stroke that he groans, "Oh fuuuuuuuuck yes!"

Either she's damn practiced at this, or it's been way, way too long since a woman's touched him there, or maybe a bit of both, because it doesn't take long at all. His whole body trembles afterward, and he lies there, half stunned, licking his lips and catching his breath while she slides her hand out and grabs a washcloth from her nearby pack to wipe up.

The fire has died down to a gentle lapping, and without any crackling, his breathing sounds extremely loud in his own ears.

"Do you want to clean yourself up?" she asks.

Clean himself up? He can barely move. Or breathe. Or think. "Later."

She tosses the washcloth she's wiped her hand with somewhere and settles back down against him with her head on his chest.

His left arm falls loosely across her. Eventually, his mind begins to form thoughts again – Why is she so damn _good_ at that? Is that something she just got really good at so she could avoid mediocre sex she didn't much want? Or is he just that bad at lasting? Is he going to last when they finally do it? Or is he just going to be another one of her mediocre sex stories?

 _Shut up_ , he tells that old, nagging voice of self-doubt. He's already given her an orgasm that's as good as her _best one_. "'S only up from here," he murmurs, and closes his eyes. Damn but he feels good. It's like there's not a single tense muscle anywhere in his body.

The feel of her small hand coming to rest against his hip is the last thing he remembers before he falls asleep.

[*]

The whining of the horses downstairs awakens Daryl. The sun has not quite risen. Carol's sound asleep, but her backpack has been moved and the crumpled washcloth is gone. There's a stack of clean towels on the end table between the arm chairs she must have scrounged up from one of the lodge rooms, and the map is open on the table next to a now dead oil lamp. He wonders how late she stayed up studying it and feels a little guilty that her orgasm was apparently not as sleep-inducing as his was.

He goes down to the basement of the lodge to check on the animals and narrowly dodges a pile of horseshit. A _thud-thud-thud_ sounds from the direction of the furniture-blocked glass door, followed by the dampened sound of growling. The horses have moved as far away from the door as they can, given the length of their tethers. He scratches Freckles's mane. "Don't worry, boy. 'M gonna take care of 'em."

Daryl peers over the furniture to judge how many there are, loads his bow, and goes through a dark hallway in the basement to the emergency exit. Cautiously, he pushes open the heavy door, and when nothing reaches inside, he emerges. He lets the door close with a softly click and then strolls all the way around the porch under the deck above. He stops at the edge of the lodge and peeks around.

One of the walkers, clad in torn-up snow boots, stops slamming against the glass door and sniffs the air. It turns its face toward Daryl and is met with an arrow between the eyes.

Daryl reloads and picks off a second walker. He reloads again and shoots a third before they get too close and he has to toss his bow and draw both knives. He strides forward between two walkers, throws out his arms, and drives the blades into the sides of their heads at once. As he jerks the blades out of the decaying flesh, he kicks back an approaching walker, and then he does the same thing again with the next two walkers until all nine are dead.

Daryl surveys his handy work while catching his breath, and then scans the slopes for more. He has to shield his eyes against the rising sun, but all seems quiet beyond the lodge.

He looks down at one of the walkers and nudges it with his foot because he thinks he sees a flash of metal that might be a knife strapped to its belt, but its only the silver clip of a crumpled and fades ski pass.

He strolls back inside, feeling like a man who has just chivalrously killed a cockroach for his woman. Not that Carol wouldn't have cleaned up just as easily, but after that hand job he got last night, she damn well deserves her rest.


	14. Chapter 14

While Carol continues to sleep, Daryl snags one of the towels and his pack and hikes to the creek he found while hunting yesterday. It's clean and free of floaters, so he strips down and washes up quickly in the frigid water, dresses in his Wranglers, his only long-sleeve shirt, and his leather vest, and then washes and wrings out his sweatpants. On the way back, he shoots a snake slithering through the knee-high grass.

Carol is awake, dressed, and making coffee when he returns. "Where were you?"

"Huntin'." He tosses the skinned snake on the table in front of her. It's not exactly breakfast in bed, but it's the best he knows how to do.

"You could have left me a note. I was worried."

Is that what it means to be more than friends? He has to leave _notes_ now? "Didn't want to wake ya."

"I fail to see how leaving a note would have awoken me."

He can't tell if she's irritated or teasing. So he points to the snake. "'S for breakfast."

"That's a big one. What is it?"

"Eastern rat snake. Ain't usually that long."

"You sleep well?" she asks, raising her pretty blue eyes suggestively to his.

He ducks his head and smiles. "Yeah. Real well. You?"

"I was up for awhile after you conked out, but once I fell asleep, I slept really well."

He goes out onto the deck to hang his sweatpants to dry while she pan fries up the snake on the fire. Daryl looks out over the hills and thinks this place, like Monticello, would make a good camp too, if they could fence it in. Not that they need a camp. They both have homes. Different homes, but homes.

He'd move to the Kingdom, though, if she asked. He'd have to bring Dog with him, of course. The animal's sprain should be healed by the time they get back. And he'd want to go on regular trading trips to the Hilltop, to spend time with Hershel and make sure the community had enough meat. He wouldn't fit in at the Kingdom, but he's used to not fitting in anywhere. Sure, the Hilltop is more his speed, but he can plant his home base anywhere, as long as he can leave to hunt and scavenge, trade and explore.

He wonders if Carol _will_ ask, if one day she'll want him to move in with her, if he'll be the Queen's _consort_. The Kingdom's subjects would probably be uneasy with a wild man hovering behind her throne. She says that this more-than-friends thing doesn't have an expiration date, but he worries things will be different when they go back. She's the head of a world where he's only a guest, and she hardly ever visits his world at all.

Daryl jumps when Carol slides her arms around him from behind and squeezes. This is what it means to be more than friends, he supposes. She gets to hug on him whenever she damn well feels like it. And maybe that means he gets to do the same. So when she slides around his side, with her arm around his waist now, he drapes an arm over her shoulders and pulls her close. They look out quietly over the slopes together, until she tells him breakfast is ready and he follows her inside.

[*]

Because the journey is downhill for miles, they make better time than yesterday. Carol, in her late-night musings, found a more efficient route than going all the way down to Lynchburg, but she assures him they'll still have several more days together, because she might want to spend an extra one in Jamestown when they get there. She says it like they're going on vacation and, in a way, he supposes they are.

He steers Freckles a little closer to her horse, scans the rural road left and right and ahead for threats, and then asks, "What kept ya up last night?"

She smiles. "I think I got a second wind from the fooling around."

He likes the way she says that, _fooling around_ , like they're in high school and he's her first real crush. "Think it put me to sleep," he admits.

"Men and women are different like that."

Are they? Nearly every woman he's fucked went to sleep soon after. Then again, nearly every one of them was drunk or high when they were fucking and probably would have gone to sleep anyway. It was always a relief to him when they did. The worst was the few times they didn't, and he had to listen to them bitch about their jobs, or their sisters, or – worst of all - their boyfriends.

He likes listening to Carol talk, though, likes the soft sound of her voice, its even keel. He likes learning more about her, even if he doesn't always know what questions to ask. "Ya like ice cream?"

"What?" she laughs.

He flushes at his lame attempt at conversation, and for a moment he's thrown right back to junior high – to the first and last time he tried to talk to a cute, sweet girl he liked. He tightens his jaws and scans for threats again.

"I like ice cream," she says, and then, clearly trying not to laugh, "Do you like ice cream?"

"Ain't no more ice cream," he mutters. What a dumb ass question that was.

"My favorite flavor was bubble gum."

Daryl forgets his embarrassment. "Aw, that shit sucked! Why'd girls always like that?"

"Because it had those little pink pieces of bubblegum lodged in it."

"'S like eatin' that cheap ass bubble gum in the quarter machines. The chiclet shit."

Carol rests one hand on the horn of her saddle. "Well, I _loved_ it."

"Ya know, ya swallow all that gum 'stead of spittin' it out, it'll make a ball in yer stomach 'n just sit there for days."

"That's just a lie our mothers told us."

It was actually the old lady who lived in the little house a mile down the mountain from their cabin who told him that. She used to offer Daryl cookies or candy or Coke if he rode his bicycle by her place, but in exchange he had to sit and listen to her talk for half an hour. He figured it was worth it. His mother, on the other hand, never told him much of anything, except _Quiet the hell down, Daryl! Mama's trying to sleep!_ Which usually meant she had a hangover.

"Pfft," he scoffs. "Next thing yer gonna tell me if ya swallow a watermelon seed, ain't gonna grow a watermelon in yer stomach."

Carol laughs, and he smiles because he made her laugh. He feels like he accomplished something, like the first time he figured out how to tie a good knot.

[*]

They camp in an old, historic plantation house. Time has taken its toll on the once bright white paint. Tall columns on the portico hold up a balcony on the second floor and Carol notes it would be a nice place to have breakfast in the morning.

But they eat dinner in the old dining room, by candle light. Daryl's snagged a rabbit, which Carol has roasted rather than stewed this time, alongside more of the wild onions she collected from the ski slopes. She gathered enough for three days. There are also wild strawberries, plucked from the grounds of the plantation. They're small and naturally bitter, but she's added some sugar and cinnamon she snagged at the Monitcello café. Daryl points to them with his fork and mumbles, "Real treat."

Between bites, he tells her he found a spring house, built over the creek where the cool waters flow, creating a sort of natural refrigerator all year long. "Should do that at the Hilltop. All we got is a root cellar."

"The Kingdom isn't near any creeks."

"Ain't the best location for a camp," he says as he pops a seasoned onion in his mouth. "Too urban."

"We've done just fine, thank you. We have electricity. And heat in the winter."

The Kingdom does, thanks to the school's old vocational programs, which included green power. "Wasn't a criticism."

"Of course it was. You think the Hilltop's better. I guess that's to be expected. Everyone cheers for their own team."

Daryl chews more slowly. She sounds suddenly upset, and he doesn't have a clue why. "Ain't we on the same team?"

"We've _always_ been on the same team," she replies. "But you know what I meant."

"Nah," he admits. "Don't."

She toys with her food for a moment and then looks across the table at him. "I know Hilltop is home for you. I know you don't _get_ the Kingdom. But those people rely on me to lead them. And it means something to me, the Kingdom's idealism. It's home."

"Know that." He still doesn't know why she's upset, though.

"Do you think you'd ever want to spend more time there? Or do you just hate it?"

So she's been thinking about the same thing he has. Maybe _she's_ also been worrying about what happens when they go back. "Don't hate it!" he insists. "Ya done good with it. Yeah. Could spend more time there, if ya want."

"I'd like that." She smiles, and they leave it at that, without making any definite plans.

[*]

After dinner, they check on the horses in the plantation's stable, secure the entryways from walkers, and then wash up in the cold creek – face and hands and teeth. They return to the house, where Daryl lights the fire in the living room and Carol makes a nest on the floor before it. She doesn't much like sleeping in strange beds, Daryl's realized, and it's probably smart. Who knows how many of them are infested with bed bugs by now.

She goes to another room to change into her sweats, and he changes in the living room, eagerly looking forward to the make out session he assumes is about to follow, but when she comes back, she sits down in the rocking chair with his leather vest and a thread and needle and starts stitching a loose seam on the inside liner.

"Don't have to do that," Daryl says. At least, not _now_. Not when they could be making out.

"You don't want it coming unraveled. It's your favorite."

"Mhmhm." Daryl plops down on the couch with the opened bottle of gin from the house in Dumfries. He takes a swig.

Carol pulls the thread through and tugs. "Are you going to be a gentleman and offer me some?"

"Ya like _gin_? _Straight up_?"

The fire crackles as she stabs the needle into the vest again. "No, but you should offer it to me."

He holds out the bottle toward her chair. "Want some gin?"

"No thank you."

"Pffft." He draws it back and sips.

She smiles. God he loves her smiles. He stretches his legs out, bare feet up on the glass-topped coffee table, and steals glances at her while she sews. He doesn't drink too much more. He doesn't want to get whiskey dick, in case she wants to make use of his dick later, and, besides, he's not the most charming drunk.

He usually doesn't mind just sitting and staring silently into the fire. God knows he's done it his share of nights alone in the woods, without hardly a thought in his head. But now it just feels like he's waiting for her to be done with her sewing, waiting he hopes, to make out again. He gets impatient waiting, swings his feet off the coffee table, twists the cap back on the gin, and says. "Gonna look 'round upstairs for loot."

No one's been living in the plantation house. It's been conserved as a historical site, and all the drawers of the dressers and desks are empty. But in one of the rooms, he finds a decent scythe hung for display on the wall. It might prove a useful farming tool once sharpened and cleaned. He brings it back down and leans it against the wall by the mantle.

Carol's done sewing, but now she's reading a book she snagged from the built-in bookcase, something leather bound that he thought was just for decoration.

 _Shit_. How long is she going to do that? "'S getting' late, huh?" he asks.

"Not that late," she replies and turns a page.

"Yeah, but, need to get an early start tomorrow."

"Why? Are you in a hurry?"

"Nah," he says. "Just…best to start early when yer travelin'."

"Then I suppose we'll start early." She turns another page. How could she have read that page so fast?

"So, if we're startin' early…should probably….you know."

"What?" She turns another page. _No way_ she read that page already.

"Go to bed."

"And sleep?" she asks innocently as she turns yet another page.

She's not reading that damn book.

She's _teasing_ him.

He sees it now, the twinkle in her eyes. But he has no idea how to tease her back. He just feels frustrated. "Wanna make out," he growls.

She looks up from the book with a raised eyebrow. "Is that a question or a statement? Or a command?"

"Do ya wanna…maybe…make out?"

A secretive smile teases the corner of Carol's lips. "I thought you'd never ask." She snaps the book shut.


	15. Chapter 15

Daryl and Carol sit on the couch, half turned toward each other, kissing. He eases his hand under her tank top cautiously, creeping his fingertips up over her bare abdomen, to give her time to stop him if she wants. She doesn't.

She hasn't taken her bra off for bed yet, so he caresses the pert mounds of her breasts beneath the lacy fabric, dips a finger into her cleavage, and then, when he feels the front clasp of the bra, fumbles until he pops her tits free of their silky cage. He takes one breast fully in his hand and squeezes gently. She moans against his mouth, and lets him play with her bare breasts while he sucks her tongue in that way she likes.

Eventually, she starts shifting her breasts against his hand like she wants something he's not delivering. "What?" he murmurs in her ear between kisses. "Tell me what ya want, sweetheart." He's not sure why the term of endearment comes out, but something about her shyness is endearing.

"That thing you did a second ago. Please. Do it again."

"What thing?"

Her cheeks flush pink. "Pinch it."

"Like this?" he murmurs into her ear and gently tweaks her nipple.

She bites her bottom lip and whimpers. He kisses her and tweaks her other nipple, and then she pushes him away. He's afraid he's done it wrong when she straddles his lap, yanks her bra out through her sleeves like some kind of magician, and then puts her hands on the back of the couch on either side of his shoulders, giving him better access under her shirt.

He slides his hands up under the soft cotton of her tank top and returns to play. Carol bends to kiss him roughly, and she gasps and squirms when he pinches both nipples at the same time.

He wishes there weren't these sweatpants between them. He wants to take her and bend her over this couch, yank her pants and panties down, and fuck her fast and hard from behind, the way he got used to doing with women. But he's determined to go at her pace and not scare her off.

And it's not just that. There's something exciting about the slow torture of making out with her. He wants it to last, and he wants to _see_ her. He actually _wants_ to face her, to see the way her eyes flash when she looks at him, the way she flutters her eyelids shut and bites her bottom lip when something feels good. He's never felt this weird sensation before - this powerful physical desire tangled with a more tender yearning.

Carol whimpers and moans while he continues to softly pinch and twist. Daryl read somewhere one time, probably in _Penthouse_ , that a woman could cum from nipple stimulation alone. He thought that was complete male fantasy bullshit. But Carol seems about ready to do just that. Of course, she's also rocking against his erection now.

"Fuck ya feel good," he groans, and she silences him with another deep kiss.

He wants to strip her shirt off - to see her, to _taste_ her, but she seems to be liking this a lot, and he doesn't want to ruin it with a possible false move. She rocks faster, enough that the couch makes a crunching noise. "Touch me," she pleads, her shyness discarded. "Down there."

He takes one hand away from her breasts and slips it inside her sweatpants, over her underwear at first, but after she grinds whimpering against his palm for a moment, he eases a finger underneath the edge of the cotton fabric and begins to play with her. She jerks her hips around his finger and rakes her teeth over his earlobe, drawing a low moan from his mouth before kissing him hard.

Her whimpers become more frustrated, and she begins to move like she's chasing the pleasure.

"Show me where," he demands, and she reaches inside her own pants, takes his hand, and shoves it down inside the top of her underwear. Her fingers splayed out over his, she moves them until he's found the spot and set the pace she seems to want, and then she draws her hand out and buries it in his hair. Her breath deepens and her fingers tighten on the strands of his hair. She lashes his tongue with hers, and cums like she did last night, only a bit harder this time, with a longer and slightly louder _Ohhhhhhhhhhhh!_ and a deeper shudder.

She collapses her forehead against his shoulder. And then she laughs. The cutest, happiest laugh he's ever heard.

"Feel good?" he asks.

"Yes. New best one."

He smiles. "Gonna be better."

When she slides off his lap to sit beside him, his hand slides out from her pants. His fingers are covered in her juices, and he reaches his hand inside his own pants and rubs them over himself for a lubricant.

Carol, her breath coming slow and shallow still, watches and asks, "Are you going to do that all by yourself, or would you like some help?"

"Love some help."

Carol licks her lips, and for a minute he thinks maybe he's going to get a blow job. But instead she turns toward to him and slips her hand inside his pants.

He doesn't have time to be disappointed, because she's already stroking him, and his head is already thudding back against the couch. He only lasts a little longer than he did last night. He's not used to all this foreplay, but he's going to _have_ to get used to it, because when they finally do the real thing, he wants to last at least long enough to get her off.

Daryl's still breathing hard when he follows her to their nest on the floor, where she wants to spoon. He's never _spooned_ with a woman before, but when she curls herself back into the curve of his body, it feels perfect, like she was _made_ to fit there. He can feel his eyelids sliding down as if drawn by weights.

 **[*]**

In the morning, they're both shy smiles and short greetings. They use up the last of the Kingdom's coffee beans, wash up separately in the creek from their night of play, and then breakfast on wild strawberries before hitting the road.

The journey is quiet and beautiful. Living in Georgia, Daryl never would have guessed Virginia had so many trees. They follow the road, but he feels encased by the forest, until the trees part like waves to reveal a farm or a small housing development or a strip mall, and then close in along the highway again.

As they ride, Daryl contemplates what base he's on, and what the next base is. In high school, the boys were always talking about running the bases. He think he's on third, but maybe it's second. Maybe third is a blowjob. Wherever he is, it feels like he's still a long way from a home run, because Carol's been learning to like it. When it happens, he wants it to be because she _asks_ for it, _directly_ , because she's _right there_ on the edge, and that way, when they do it, maybe it'll be great for her.

Maybe it hasn't been great because she's always done it on someone else's timetable, or, in the case of Ezekiel, on her own timetable, but under the pressure of a wedding night. If they can do it when her body instead of just her mind demands it, maybe it'll be as good as he hopes for her. As much as he wants her, the last thing he wants is to be her duty.

"What are you thinking in that head of yours?" Carol asks.

Feeling caught, Daryl lies, "Just wonderin' if anyone's left. Gone almost three hundred miles, ain't seen a soul."

"I'm sure there are still other camps out there, somewhere. I guess we should decide what to do if we stumble on one."

"Avoid it."

"That's my vote, too. You never know what you're getting into. We've done well, allying our camps, but you never know. I'd hate to stir up a hornet's nest."

The Hilltop and Kingdom used to take people in, but they don't do that anymore, not since Alexandria took in a lone woman and her infant. She claimed her small group had been overrun by walkers, and she was all that was left. And with a baby, how could they refuse? But one night she left her baby asleep in its crib, snuck out, and slit the throats of the watch. She let eight warriors in through the gate. Her people weren't dead. They were waiting for their moment to take the place over. They were stopped, but not before six Alexandrians were murdered in their sleep. They probably would have killed a lot more if two of the men hadn't paused in their killings to rape. The alarm was sounded, and four more Alexandrians died in the fight that followed.

Michonne sent a messenger to Daryl to ask him to track the rest of the group, the ones who didn't come in through the gate to fight but waited for their people to clear the way. Daryl found them, or rather their gnawed-over remains. Without their warriors to defend them, they truly were overrun by walkers. He spent days tracking, making sure every last one had died or turned. He found only one alive, a young teenage boy who begged for mercy on his knees. Daryl let him go, but told him if he was ever seen near Alexandria again, he was dead. The boy couldn't have survived long out there alone in the wilderness, with nothing but a knife, but at least Daryl didn't kill him directly. His conscience would never have rested.

"If we come across anyone," Carol says, "we're not from anywhere. We've just been husband and wife since before the collapse. And we've just been roaming and surviving the whole time."

"Why a husband 'n wife?"

"Because if we pretend we're brother and sister," she reasons, "the way you look at me is going to be creepy."

"Pfft."

"Also, I don't want anyone thinking I'm available."

"Good. 'Cause ya ain't."

"Staking your claim?"

"Nah. Yeah. No. Mean…Ya ain't, right?" More than friends means she's not looking for anyone else, doesn't it?

She laughs. What the hell does that laugh mean?

"Ya ain't, are ya?"

"Are you planning to chase other women now that we're together?" Carol asks.

"Wasn't plannin' to chase other women when we weren't."

"No, I'm not available."

Daryl's tense muscles unwind.

Carol shivers at a gust of wind and lets loose the reins long enough to snap up her jacket. "Is it going to rain again?"

"Looks like. Near sunset anyhow." The trees have thinned out again, which means there must be development up ahead, businesses perhaps, or homes. "'S find shelter."


	16. Chapter 16

They find a brick strip mall as a light drizzle begins to fall from the grayed-over sky. The one place without completely shattered windows is a bar and grill, and that's because the windows have been nailed over with boards and four heavily armed men were once holding the place. They're all walkers now, and Daryl and Carol dispense with them quickly.

A thick coat of dust yellows the surface of the brown tables, and empty liquor bottles lay strewn on tables and in booths. A few have been shattered on the floor behind the bar. They clear the place and find it to be much bigger from the inside than it appears to be from the outside. There's even a small private room with a leather couch, a table for ten, and a fireplace. The table has been pushed all the way against the far wall and the chairs stacked on it to make room for the deflated air mattresses that line the floor in front of the couch.

"Let's drag the walkers out and stay here the night," Carol suggests. "It's secure, no broken windows, only one entrance and one exit, and this room to sleep in."

"Hell we gonna do with the horses? Can't fit through that front door."

"I think they'll fit in through the kitchen door that opens onto the loading dock. We can leave them in the kitchen. Just make sure we clear out anything sharp, put some fresh water out for them."

"A'ight."

Carol leads the horses around back while Daryl drags out the walkers. When he comes in after taking out the last one, Carol's spraying an air freshner from the bathroom in the bar area. "Seriously?" he asks.

"I know you don't smell walker anymore, but I do."

"I _smell_ it. Just don't bother me none. That shit on the other hand…" He waves a hand in front of his face and coughs.

"It's lilac. I like it."

They gather up and inspect the guns: eight rifles, four shotguns, and six handguns.

"That's a lot of guns for four people," Carol says.

"Country boys," Daryl replies.

They each claim one rifle for the road, but they won't bother with the other firearms. There are plenty of guns back home. It's the ammunition they lack, which is why neither bothered to bring a rifle for the journey. But behind the bar Carol finds six unopened boxes of .22, four boxes of 9 mm, three boxes of .308, and two boxes of shotgun shells, along with the bullets already in the magazines of the rifles and handguns. "Jackpot!" she exclaims.

"Any booze left back there?" Daryl asks.

She sets an unopened bottle of whiskey on the cherry oak bar. "Looks like they drank everything else. There's a little left in some other bottles, but they've probably been open too long. I wouldn't be surprised if they all died of alcohol poisoning one night."

A CD boom box sits on the bar next to a haphazard stack of CDs. Daryl picks it up, flips it over, and finds it has no batteries. He looks at the small, battery-operated appliances on the counter behind the bar and on some of the tables. "Looks like they had a lot of battery-operated shit. Wonder if they got more batteries in that storage room."

"Let's see."

The storage room feels about ten degrees cooler than the rest of the bar, which means that if there _are_ batteries, they may not have gone bad in the hot summer.

"Eureka!" Carol shouts as she pulls out a cardboard box from the shelf. Batteries. Still in their original packaging. Dozens of them, and three different kinds. "If these work, we're going to have to leave behind the open bottles of booze from the house in Dumfries to make room for them."

"Nah! We got enough room."

"Not for the dried beans, salt, rice, and sugar, too," she says, pointing to another shelf, which has one unopened package of each. The open ones they find to be crawling with weevils.

"Fine. I'll drink down the gin tonight, 'n we'll leave the brandy behind."

"MREs, too," Carol says. "Four left. Need to make room for those."

"Nah. Let's just eat those for super." There's not going to be much good hunting near a strip mall, and, besides, it's raining hard outside now. He can here the pitter patter above.

"All four?"

"Ain't had much lunch."

"We should save two for the road," she insists. "We'll split a bottle of wine tonight to make room."

They open one of the packages of AA batteries and test them on a small, battery-operated table lamp and some kind of disco light ball on a stand. They both work, and the disco ball casts multicolored light in a haze over the barroom floor. "Funky," Carol says. "Let's try the boom box."

She slides in the batteries, slips in an Aretha Franklin CD, and hits play. Music blares out:

 _What you want,_  
 _Baby, I got it!_  
 _What you need,_  
 _Do you know I got it?_

Carol starts dancing backward and singing along. Daryl leans back against the bar and watches with a smirk.

Eventually she dances toward him, singing along:

 _Oooh your kisses, are sweeter than honey_  
 _And guess what?_

She laces a finger in his belt loop and starts pulling him from the bar.

 _So is my money._

"Ain't yer money I want."

"Yeah, what do you want?" She pushes up against him and starts trying to get him to sway. "You want to dance with me?"

"Can't dance," he says.

"It's not that hard," she insists. "Just put your hands on my hips."

He does, and she wraps her arms around his neck, and they sway together for a while, but eventually he twists his neck to ease it out from under her arms and steps back. "I can't dance worth shit. And this ain't 'zactly a slow dance song."

She pouts. "Party pooper. You know dance is just foreplay. Your loss."

Wait. Does that mean they aren't making out again tonight? "Nah, can dance, let's dance." He grabs her by the waist and yanks her in. Her forehead slams against his nose.

"Ow!" she says and steps back.

"Sorry," he mutters and rubs his own nose.

"Maybe dancing isn't in your skill set," she concedes. "Let's just enjoy the music." She walks back to the stack of CDs. "I want to listen to all of these. Well, maybe not Metallica."

"They got Metallica? Hell yeah!" He pops open the lid to the player so that Aretha stops signing.

"Hey! I was listening to that."

"Nah. We're listenin' to this." Daryl cracks open the Metallica CD, pops it in, cranks up the music, and starts banging his head. Carol lunges for the CD player and turns the volume down.

"You'll attract walkers," she scolds him. Then she laughs. "I never pegged you for a headbanger."

"Why not? Don't I look like one?"

"I thought you'd like old school country. Johnny Cash. Merle Haggard. Hank Williams."

Daryl smirks. "Patsy Cline?"

"Well, maybe not Patsy Cline."

"Pfft. Well I never pegged you for a soul sister."

"I do love Aretha. And Sam and Dave. And Otis Redding. Oh, God, especially Otis Redding. If they have Otis," she starts sifting through the stack of CDs, "we're listening to him tonight when we make out."

So that means they are still making out, even though he can't dance? "They got Otis?" he asks hopefully.

"No, but they have Van Morrison." She holds up Moondance. "That'll do."

"Asshole's white."

"He has soul. Trust me. You don't like Van Morrison?"

Daryl shrugs. "Who is he?"

"You don't know Van Morrison? Brown Eyed Girl?"

"Oh, that guy," Daryl mutters.

"Well that's not his best song," Carol assures him.

"My girl's got blue eyes anyhow."

That must have been a good thing to say, because Carol smiles and kisses him softly. She pulls away though, just when it's getting interesting. "Well, if we're listening to your music," she says, "then we're playing my game." She points to the fooz ball table.

"That's yer game?" Daryl asks skeptically.

"That's my game."

"Pfft. A'ight."

Daryl has every intention of letting her win, until he realizes she really does know what she's doing, and then he's determined to beat her.

He doesn't.

"Fuck," he mutters when the little white ball flies into his goal to score the game winning point. "Where ya been playin' fooz ball?" Daryl's played it in bars before. He thought he was pretty good at it.

"My first boyfriend had a table. We used to play it all the time, every time we went to his house."

"The asshole who dumped ya when ya wouldn't fuck 'em?"

"I probably just should have. Then maybe I'd have ended up married to him instead of Ed. And Harold wasn't so bad. Other than dumping me for not putting out…he treated me pretty well." She smiles teasingly. "But then I might never have met you."

"Would he of got ya through the first few weeks?" Ed was a piece of shit, but he had storage food. He had a shotgun. And he got his wife and daughter out of their town when the walkers overran it.

"Probably. Harold really filled out when he hit puberty. He was a linebacker on the football team in high school. And he joined the Navy after he graduated. I imagine he could fight." She slaps one of the poles of the fooz ball table, and her little chipped yellow men spin. The whir is loud, because the last song on the Metallica CD has just finished. "You know what I like about this?"

"Fooz ball?"

"No. Us."

Daryl waits for her to continue.

"Wherever this goes…or doesn't go…I know you're always going to be a part of my life. Because we've been through the crucible together." She looks up from the table and at him. "Right?" she asks, as though maybe she's just as worried as he is about where this is all going to end.

"Right," he assures her.

"Let's get ready for bed."

They change into their sweats, take the boom box with them into the private room, put on some music, and light the fire. Daryl opens a bottle of wine for Carol, but he hits the open bottle of gin when he plops down onto the black leather couch.

"You expect me to drink this whole bottle of wine by myself?" she asks as she sits down beside him and plucks the glass he's poured her from off the floor. "Are you trying to get in my pants?"

"Only as far in as ya want me."

They both get a little drunk. Well, a lot drunk if he's being honest. They can't help it, because it feels like a party, with the music and the giddiness from all the stuff they found.

But Daryl's not a mean drunk tonight because he's happy, happier than he can ever remember being, and he guesses maybe the liquor's always just magnified whatever mood was already beneath the surface.

They end up making out sloppily in their nest by the fire, and despite all the gin he drank, he's still as hard as a rock. She tugs his shirt over his head and traces every sinew on his chest. She kisses the lashes on his back and asks about his tattoo.

She lets him get her shirt off tonight, too, and roll her on her back to rake his eyes over her. Maybe it's the wine that makes her less shy, or maybe she would have let him anyway. He doesn't know. He just knows she beautiful and he could stare at her tits for hours, and that she likes it when he flicks her nipple with his tongue, because she tells him, "I like that I like that I like that oh my God I really really like that" and then titter-laughs.

He laughs too and drags his mouth from her breast to her lips and kisses her.

When he pulls away, her eyes are closed, as if maybe the room is spinning on her. "Fuck me," she says.

"What?"

"Fuck me good and hard."

"Yer drunk."

"You're drunker," she mumbles.

"No. Pretty sure yer drunker."

"I know I am but what are you?"

"'M hard. 'M hard as…" His brain is slipping over its own thoughts. "…a goddamn thing that's really….really…hard."

"Then fuck me," she insists, her eyes still closed, and her arm now flung over them. "Fuck me any way you want to. I'm not going anywhere."

He'd like to. He'd like to fuck her any way he wants to, and there's about a dozen ways he can think he wants to. But he's not so sure she's going to really feel it at this point, and he's not so sure she's not going to pass out on him halfway through. "Yer drunk." He throws himself on his back beside her. "Go to sleep drunk woman."

"But then who's going to take care of you?"

"Take care of myself." He's not sure he's going to need to, though. His erection is starting to fade.

"Can I watch?" she asks.

"If ya can stay awake."

She rolls on her side and tucks her hands under her cheek. "I'm going to watch. Dooooo it!"

He snorts. "Well now I ain't hard no more, drunk lady."

"I'm watching," she insists, but then she closes her eyes, and she doesn't open them again that night.


	17. Chapter 17

When Daryl wakes up, Carol's not in their nest on the floor. He drags himself up and stumbles around looking for his muscle shirt. When he shakes out the sleeping bag, the shirt flutters out. After dressing, he finds Carol sitting at the bar with a canteen of water, a cup of coffee, and a bottle of aspirin from that school nurse's office beside her. He settles onto the stool next to her, and she pushes the aspirin over.

"'M fine," he says. "Nothin' coffee won't cure."

"You can have the rest of mine." She slides over her half-finished cup. "It's not sitting well with my stomach."

He sips. The instant crystals aren't as good as the Kingdom's beans, but she made it _strong_.

Carol traces the pattern in the wood on the bar with a single fingertip. "What did we do last night?"

"Ya don't 'member?"

"I remember _some_ of it. I know we had a good time. But did we…" She turns her head just enough to peer at him.

"Nah. Not that. Not yet."

She looks relieved.

"Would it of been so damn awful if we had?" he asks defensively.

"No, of course not. But I'd like to remember our first time. I'd like it to be…you know. _Special._ "

"Yeah," he murmurs softly. "Figured. 'S why I didn't fuck ya when ya asked me to."

"I asked you to?"

He sets the coffee cup down. "'Least three times."

She slides to the edge of her stool, puts a hand on both his cheeks, turns his face to hers, and kisses him hard.

[*]

A grasping walker lies, with half its body missing, on the highway. Carol casually steers around it and meets up with Daryl's horse again. They've ridden for hours, and they're probably less than five miles from the historic Jamestown settlement now. They saw a sign not long ago. They'll get there just before sunset, camp there, and in the morning Carol can search for evidence of her long dead ancestor.

"So what was _your_ favorite flavor?" Carol asks. "Of ice cream."

"'Nilla."

"How boring."

"Ain't borin'," he insists over the light clomp-clomp-clomp of the horses' hooves. "Makes the best base."

"But by _itself_ , it's boring."

"Nah. Ain't. No one takes the time to 'preciate it, 's all."

She steers a little closer to him, so that their legs and horses are near brushing, and teases, "So you like to take your time appreciating things, _do you_?"

He rolls his eyes. He knows this is another one of her lame sex jokes, but as usual he's not entirely sure what she's going for. "Stahp."

She laughs. "Oh, come on, you love it."

"Don't."

"You love my corny jokes," she insists.

"Don't love yer corny jokes. Just love you."

Carol's horse slows slightly, and it's only when Daryl's pulled ahead by a few paces that he realizes what he just said. When she catches up to him, he looks straight ahead. He can feel her eyes on his face.

She begins to speak. "Did you just say – "

A gunshot in the distance startles the horses, and they rear back. A burst of frightened birds flies over their heads across the highway.

"Shit!" Daryl cries while steadying Freckles.

From somewhere around a bend in the highway, horse hooves pound the pavement with a force that sounds like a cavalry.

"Quick," Carol cries, "In the woods!"

They drive their horses off the road and into the brush, leaping them over a fallen tree, and steering around the foliage until they're just far enough in to be masked. They dismount quickly. "Stay with the horses," Daryl orders. "Keep 'em quiet 'n safe. Gonna take a look."

"Careful," she warns as she fishes out a pair of binoculars from her pack and hands them over. "And take a rifle."

"'M a better shot with my bow."

"If they see you, you won't have time to reload."

He relents, swings his crossbow onto the ground, and draws out the rifle from behind the saddle. He returns to the edge of the tree line, where he lies obscured in the brush to survey the highway.

A man on a horse thunders by, riding hard. He holds a black semiautomatic handgun in his right hand, and turns to shoot behind himself, at what, Daryl can't see, until eight more mounted men burst on the scene.

The man who leads the pursuers rides hands free, gripping his horse with his legs while aiming a wooden rifle with two hands. Long, wavy brown hair spills out from beneath the white Stetson hat that rests atop his head, and both a machete and a silver revolver ride his right hip. There's a crack from his rifle, and the spent brass flies back and clatters on the asphalt.

The fleeing man jerks forward and then back before tumbling off his horse, which keeps galloping on. He rolls over onto his back and, screaming, seizes the shoulder where he was shot.

The man in back of the posse bends down like a jockey, drives forward, and overtakes the rest of the group as he pursues the now riderless horse. Meanwhile, the other seven men rear to a stop, dismount, run to the fallen man, and surround him at the point of guns and swords.

The man in the white Stetson says something to one of the posse members, who returns to his horse, pulls out a long pole from behind the saddle, and jogs to an abandoned pick-up truck on the shoulder of the road. He leaps into its bed and clatters onto its roof, where he stands and unravels a flag. The man begins to wave the flag, and the red cross ripples of the white background.

Daryl recognizes that flag from the American history book series he used to page through when he was sent to the library during recess for misbehaving. It's the St. George Cross - one of the flags carried to the New World by the early English explorers. The man waves the flag in a strange, controlled, and patterned way. Soon enough, Daryl realizes the flag waver is using Morse code, probably to communicate with someone farther down the road.

A gunshot sounds to his right, and Daryl swivels the binoculars back to find the man in the white Stetson shouldering his rifle. The posse steps away from the fallen man, who now lies dead on the pavement with a bullet in his forehead.

If Daryl wanted to kill someone who was already down, he wouldn't waste a bullet doing it. These men must have a lot of ammunition back in their camp, if they can expend it so recklessly. The thought makes him nervous. He and Carol would do best to lay low in the woods until the group has gone back in the southern direction from which it came. In fact, maybe it would be best for the two of them to head back north and stay out of the gunmen's territory altogether.

Daryl is thinking all this, and just beginning to swivel the binoculars back to the waving flag, when he hears another gunshot – from _behind_ him this time – in the woods.

His heart thuds _Carol!_

He drops the binoculars and uses both hands to push himself up. Scrambling to his feet, he unshoulders his rifle and plunges anxiously into the woods. Freckles gallops toward him, slapping through branches, snapping twigs, and neighing frantically. Eager to get to Carol, Daryl doesn't pause to stop the fleeing horse, but crashes forward through the woods.

He finds her sitting propped up against a tree and drawing deep breaths while applying pressure to a wound at her side. Blood seeps through the fingers of her bare hands. Her handgun rests on the forest floor beside her. Carol's horse has not left her side, but whinnies softly. A man lies on the forest floor not far from the animal, and just beyond his unraveled fingers gleams a bloody knife. The bullet wound is in his chest. He must have approached her from behind. She heard, turned while drawing, and got slashed in the side before she shot him at close range.

"Daryl," she half whispers, and then flings her head back against the trunk of the tree.

Daryl runs to the saddlebags on her horse and throws the flaps open to begin his desperate search for the medical supplies. With a sinking sensation, he remembers the supplies were in the saddle bags tied to the fleeing Freckles. So he rips her backpack from the horse, unlatches it violently, and draws out a clean, white tank top. Then Daryl falls to his knees before her.

Carol lets her hands slide weakly from her side, and he presses the balled shirt hard and tight over her wound to try to stem the bleeding. Her eyes begin to roll back into her head.

"Hold on, sweetheart," he murmurs. "Just hold on."


	18. Chapter 18

When a twig snaps from the hoof of a horse, or from the foot of a deer, or even from a walker, it sounds different than when it snaps beneath the heel of a man's boot. Daryl knows all the snapping sounds, and he knows the crack he just heard means there's a man coming up behind him.

He drops the bloodied shirt he's using to try to stop Carol's bleeding and reaches for his rifle on the ground. As soon as he's gripped it, a black-and-white, spotted, calf-skin cowboy boot comes down hard on top of his hand, so hard that Daryl thinks that heel might snap his fingers like it snapped that twig. The pressure of the heel lets up, ever so slightly, as more twigs snap from behind.

Daryl looks up slowly, first into the barrel of the rifle that's pointed at his head, and then over a metal belt buckle in the shape of a coiled serpent surrounded by the words _Don't Tread on Me_ , up a brown suede jacket, over a Doc-Holiday-style goatee and mustache, and finally into the coal-gray eyes of the man in the white Stetson.

"I'm going to take my boot off your hand," White Stetson says as his men begin to flank him. One man scoops up Carol's fallen handgun, and a second seizes the crossbow Daryl left behind when he went to investigate. A third takes hold of the reins of Carol's horse and peers into the saddle bags. A fourth crouches down to check the dead man for a pulse and then picks up the attacker's knife. Daryl can feel a fifth man standing directly behind him, likely with a gun pointed to the back of his head. "And when I do, you're going to ever so slowly raise both of your hands and lace them behind your head."

Daryl does what he's told. There's not much else he can do at this point. When his hands are laced behind his head, the man behind him drags him to his feet, and another man pats him down and strips him of his weapons. Daryl's hands are wrenched down, and cool, steel handcuffs click down tightly on his wrists.

White Stetson crouches by Carol, peers at her wound, and then removes her knives from her waist, pats down her pants legs, and finally slides out the knife she keeps concealed in her boot.

"Please," Daryl begs, even though he has no reason to believe these are good men. But the desperation wells up in him. "She's been cut bad. Needs help."

White Stetson stands and looks over Daryl's shoulder. Daryl cranes his neck back to see another man emerging from the foliage and leading Freckles by the reins.

"I got their horse, Sheriff!" the man calls as he approaches.

"'S medical supplies in that saddle pack!" Daryl cries. "Ya can use 'em to stop 'er bleedin'. _Please_."

"Thomas," White Stetson orders one of his men. "Stop her bleeding. Then bind the wound."

A thirty-something, freckled, auburn-haired man answers, "Yes, Sheriff." He digs in the arriving horse's saddle pack and pulls out gauze, scissors, pads, and tape and goes to work on Carol.

White Stetson – or, Daryl supposes he can say now – the s _herriff_ \- examines the scene, his eyes flitting from Carol to Daryl to the fallen body to the horses. Coolly, he says, "Your woman shot my man."

Daryl's gut sinks. He's not sure what kind of vengeance this man might want to exact. Maybe none if he's ordering the patching up of Carol. Or maybe he plans to exact the worst kind of vengeance, and he's only patching her up to take her for a sinister purpose. The thought sends a flash of rage up Daryl's spine.

"He attacked her," the sheriff says calmly. "From behind. With a knife." He paces the scene. "She turned and shot him in the chest." He stops before the fallen man's body. "She denied me the pleasure." He makes a sound as if clearing his throat, and then spits in the dead man's face. Surprised, Daryl steps back.

As the sheriff is looking down at the attacker's chest wound, the dead man's jaw falls open in a low gasp, and his glassy eyes roll up. His hands begin to clutch at the forest earth. The sheriff draws his machette and drives it into the walker's forehead. Then he flicks a flowing blue bandana from his back pocket, and as he cleans the blade, asks, "Johnny, did the horse they stole get away?"

"Sorry, Sheriff," the man who brought in Freckles answers. "I couldn't catch up. But I got this one." He raises the reins of Freckles. "And all the loot on it."

"Jacob," the sheriff orders, "Go look for a camp back there."

A man nods and disappears into the woods behind Carol.

"Why was the other one so far down the highway," Johnny asks, "if they were camped all the way up here? They had to know we were out searching. Why haven't they moved on?"

"Well," the sheriff replies, "I reckon he was looking for buried treasure. You saw him digging at the side of the road before he spied us and fled. Why don't you go ride on back down the road and see just what he was digging up?"

Johnny nods, leaves Freckles with another man, and vanishes toward the road.

The swarthy man standing by Carol's horse has a lustful look in his dark eyes. He licks his lips and says, "We're gonna have us a good time tonight, Sheriff." Daryl thinks he's looking down at Carol, and rage rushes once again from the tip of his head down through every nerve in his body. He's about to do something stupid, like run over and head butt the asshole, when the man yanks a bottle of whiskey out of the saddle pack, and Daryl realizes he was looking down at the liquor instead of at Carol. "They've got more where that came from. Wine, too."

"Don't touch anything," the sheriff orders. "It needs to be inventoried when we get back. You'll get your share when the time comes."

Daryl guesses that means they're being robbed, but he doesn't suppose they're being murdered. At least not yet.

"Bleeding's stopped," says the man helping Carol – Thomas, Daryl remembers, because he's silently noting down all these names. "But she's lost a lot of blood. She's lost consciousness, but she's breathing. She needs stitches. Maybe even a blood transfusion."

"Put her on her horse and get her back to the infirmary," the sheriff orders. "On the way, tell Hank to signal the relay. Let them know both fugitives are down now, and we're coming in with two unknowns. One wounded."

"Yes, Sherriff."

Two of the sheriff's men help Carol onto the horse, and Thomas gets on behind her and wraps his arm low around her waist, below her wound. She jerks to sudden consciousness, hissing in pain, and then slumps forward again. Thomas leads the horse through the woods and Daryl feels an angry helplessness whirl in the pit of his stomach.

Behind them, the trees rustle, and the remaining men aim their rifles. When the man who was sent to look for a camp emerges from the brush, they all lower their weapons. He holds up a pack and says, "I found the camp. This is all the gear they had, though it looks like they killed six cannibals last night."

"Take it back and inventory it," the sheriff orders. "All y'all, ride on up ahead. Hank and I will bring in the man."

The sheriff's men disappear, leaving only him and Daryl in the woods. "Don't run off, now," the sheriff warns, and crouches down to rifle through the dead walker's pockets. He pulls out a pocket knife that he just leaves on the ground. Then he pulls out a piece of notepaper, unfolds it, and studies it. He stands and takes Daryl by the elbow and starts leading him through the forest.

There's no sign of Carol or the other men when they get to the road. The flag wielding Hank, and three horses, including Daryl's, are the only ones left. Hank is a blond, scrawny, lightly-tanned man with an effete wisp of a mustache. The sheriff tells him, "Signal back to camp. Have Earl round up Daniel and put him in a cell and assemble a jury." He holds up the note he pulled off the dead man. "The damn fool signed his own name."

 _A jury_ , Daryl thinks. These are a people of the law, which is a good sign. But even a people of the law can have one law for the group and another for the foreigner. They can execute one of their own for stealing a horse, and then turn around and rob a man they find in the woods. They can be brutal to strangers, especially if they suspect those strangers might be spies for an enemy.

Hank climbs to the roof of the truck again and starts waving his flag. It takes a long time and Daryl is losing patience. He wants to be with Carol, to find out how she is.

Hank finally comes down from the truck, rolls his flag around the pole, and loads it behind the saddle of his horse.

"I'm taking your horse," the sheriff tells Daryl, "and you're taking mine."

Daryl's not sure why the sheriff is making the switch, unless it's that he doesn't want Daryl to be anywhere near those saddle bags or the potential weapons in them. Or maybe he just doesn't want Daryl on a familiar horse. Maybe he knows he can whistle his own horse to a stop if Daryl tries riding off on it.

The sheriff takes out his handcuff key. "You aren't going to be able to balance well on a horse with those things on behind you. So I'm taking them off. You'll ride between us. You try to ride ahead, or you fall behind, or you try to _touch_ us, and I'll shoot you faster than a hot knife through butter. Understood?"

Daryl nods. It's not as if he'd run away and leave Carol behind, anyway. As he mounts the sheriff's horse, under the man's watchful eye, he wonders what he's gotten Carol into and what these people will do with them once she's healed. He wants to ask a hundred questions, but decides its best to ride carefully and silently and learn what he can, for now, through open ears.


	19. Chapter 19

"I hear there's booze in those saddle bags," Hank says, talking across Daryl to the sheriff as they ride.

"Indeed," the sheriff answers.

"You know what _that_ means." Hank's face breaks out in a lopsided grin. "Gonna be a party tonight!"

"Gonna be a long line tonight," the sheriff mutters.

"Well," Hank says, "I can wait my turn. I'm a patient man." There's silence for a while, and then Hank says, "There's eight of us, and finders get a sixth of everything, so how much is that per person? One tenth?"

"Less than that."

"I don't know why the captain _always_ gets a tenth," Hank grumbles. "When he ain't even _here_."

"Perks of leadership, I suppose," the sheriff replies.

"You should be captain instead of him," Hank complains.

"Careful."

"I ain't the only one who thinks it," Hank mutters beneath his breath.

Daryl wonders who this captain is. He assumed the sheriff was in charge, but apparently he's only in charge of the posse and not the camp.

"What are you gonna do with _your_ share of the booze?" Hank asks.

"Well, I imagine I'm going to drink it," the sheriff replies.

"That's a damn waste," Hank tells him. "I'll trade it to you for a pack of double As."

The sheriff pushes his Stetson up on his forehead. "I don't think so."

"Two packs?"

"I'll mull it over."

"That's a good trade, Sheriff," Hank insists. "That's a damn good trade."

They ride about a mile and pass a man in a wooden stand with a rifle on his right shoulder, a flag leaned against the rail of the stand, and a telescope in his left hand. He calls down a greeting to the sheriff.

They ride another three miles and pass three different men in watch stands. Each man, like the last, has a rifle, a telescope, and a flag. This is both their lookout and their telegraph, Daryl supposes – one flag man signals to another and so on to spread messages for miles in Morse code.

It's a long ride, and Daryl worries it must have been a hard one for Carol. Eventually, they reach the Jamestown historic site, and someone rolls open an iron gate for them. They ride through the parking lot and dismount outside the entry building. Three teenage boys appear from out of seeming nowhere to take the horses. "Take everything in those saddle bags straight to inventory," the sheriff demands. "Don't touch anything."

"Yes, Sheriff," one of them replies.

The sheriff cuffs Daryl again, with his hands behind his back, and takes him by one arm to lead him through the front door marked Entrance. Hank goes with them. They walk over marbled floors past an information booth and a ticket stand and into a museum. They turn right down a hallway with a blue hall sign that reads "museum offices," pass a breakroom, and then the sheriff peers into an empty office. They must have solar power in this building, or at least in this wing of it, because there's an overhead light on in the office. The sheriff sighs and clicks it off, muttering, "Captain can't conserve worth a damn."

"We're gonna end up with brownouts again," Hank agrees. "Not that the rest of us peons will notice, out there in the huts and cabins."

"We'll notice when the storage freezers go out." The sheriff closes the office door and then tugs Daryl back to the left. As they wend their way through the museum, they enter an open area full of bunk beds, like a barracks. Each bed is labeled with a first name. Some of the beds have stuffed animals in them, or kids' clothes hanging off the rails, and Daryl wonders if this is some kind of orphanage. There must be at least eighteen beds.

A kid, about eight years old, rounds the corner, takes a step toward the bunk beds, and freezes. He looks at the sheriff with wide, frightened eyes.

"You're supposed to be in school, Terrence," the sheriff says.

"Yes, sir, Sheriff, sir. I was just running back to get my baseball cards."

"You don't need your baseball cards for school, young man. You need to be paying attention to the headmistress."

"Yes, sir!" Little Terrence takes two steps backward, turns on his heels, and runs.

They continue through the museum, and the whole time Daryl looks around for any sign of an infirmary or of Carol. He wants to ask about her, but he thinks his best bet at the moment is to remain silent and observe.

They come out of the museum into the bright evening sunlight and pass a large, plastic-encased map of the historic Jamestown settlement. They walk past a sea of flags – colonial, British, Virginia, and others - in some kind of garden centerpiece, which has now been planted with herbs, and then down a path alongside a dock where three re-creations of old wooden, colonial ships float. One, called the _Susan Constant_ , looks like it just returned from an afternoon out on the James River, and nets full of fish are being slung onto the dock.

They walk past a greenhouse tent, a small orchard of fruit trees, and then a farm field where men and women work. Next, they reach the old wooden, triangular fence marking the entrance to the re-creation of the historic Jamestown settlement, and the sheriff leads Daryl inside.

The place is full of the sounds of life and labor. Chickens cluck loudly in a wooden chicken coop. Goats bleat as they clamor up and down the ramp of a playhouse. A hammer clanks iron in the old blacksmith's shop. Horses snort and whinny in the stables. Milk squirts into a tin bucket in a barn as a cow moos. The smoky scent of meat drifts from the smokehouse, and a cleaver comes down hard on a table in the old butcher's shop. A woman is drawing water from a well, and another is beating a rug outside of a small, timber-framed, thatch-roofed cabin. There are kids in the one-room schoolhouse, being drilled in math, and kids outside it, having recess, laughing and yelling as they play old style games like horseshoes.

Someone bursts out of a wooden outhouse as they're passing by. Buckling his belt, he says, "Evenin', sheriff. Howdy, Hank." Both men nod and lead Daryl on. When they pass the jail house, Daryl peers inside and sees two iron cells, one of which is currently occupied. The inmate looks at him curiously.

They move beyond the colonial settlement, out an opening in the rear fence, and through to a series of re-created Native American adobes, in which, based on the bedding inside, it appears entire families live. A woman sits on a straw-like bench outside of one, grinding corn with a stone mortar and pestle to make cornmeal. A few yards behind the adobes are a long row of at least a dozen blue port-a-potties, drawn perhaps from construction sites. They make a strange contrast with the ancient huts.

Outside the last of the adobes, which is a long one, stand two women in low-cut dresses. Every other woman in the settlement was wearing practical clothing, and Daryl does a stunned double take. He hasn't seen a woman in a _dress_ since Negan's harem. They're striking coquettish poses against the outside wall of the hut. "Hey, handsome," one of them calls to Hank. "Word is you found booze."

"We sure did!" Hank replies excitedly. "I should get my rations tonight."

"Well stop by and see me when you do."

The sheriff stops suddenly before the entryway of the hut, which is covered by dangling strings of colorful beads. Daryl almost runs into him, and the Sheriff drops the arm he's been holding to lead him.

"You, too, Sheriff," the other woman says. "Why don't you stop by and see me tonight?"

"I doubt my wife would approve," the sheriff replies.

"Honey, you know I can do things your wife _won't_."

"Fortunately, I'm a man of simple tastes." The sheriff nods toward the beaded doorway. "Is the captain in there by any chance? He wasn't in his office."

The woman parts the beads, ducks her head inside the entry way of the hut, and yells, "Captain! Sheriff here to see you."

She moves out of the way and leans back against the hut. Ten seconds later, the beads part violently. A mountain of a man appears in the doorway, as big as Abraham was, with flashing, hazel eyes and a tight black buzz cut. His bare chest is a thick blanket of dark, curly hair, and his belt is unbuckled and loose over his pants. "Damn it to hell, Garland! What could be so goddamn impor - " He falls silent and looks at Daryl. "Who the hell is this?"

"I sent a relay message," Sheriff Garland replies. "Both fugitives are dead, but we lost the horse they stole."

"Fuck!" the captain roars.

"One of the fugitives wounded a woman. She's in the infirmary. This is her…" He glances at Daryl.

"Husband," Daryl answers. It's what Carol said to say he was, after all, if they ran into people.

"I thought you'd want to question him, Captain."

"Well not _now_ , man! Put him in a cell. I'll deal with him later."

"I could accompany you when you _do_ question him," the sheriff suggests.

"No need for that, Garland."

"I appreciate being able to observe your expertise," Sheriff Garland replies.

Daryl watches as Hank – and both women - bite down on smiles.

"Fine, but later. As you can see, I'm _busy_." The captain looks Daryl up and down suspiciously. "Did he and his wife have any loot on them?"

"Lots of booze," one of the women says. " _Real_ booze. Not moonshine. Or so the rumor mill says."

The captain grins. "Is that so? Well, then, sugar tits, you come on in here, too, and I'll pay you later." He slaps her ass. She squeals and runs into the hut.

"What am I?" the other woman mutters as the captain disappears through the beads. "Chopped liver?"

"I'll keep you company," Hank says and he throws himself back against the hut next to her.

"Not until you've got something to _pay_ for my company," she tells him, but Hank doesn't budge from his spot.

Sheriff Garland takes Daryl by the arm, turns him around, and starts tugging him back in the direction of the jailhouse.

The men's excitement over the booze makes a lot more sense now. This place has a goddamn _brothel_ , and the currency is whiskey and wine. Daryl can't help but peer back over his shoulder at the unexpected scene, and the whore who's talking to Hank waves her fingers at him one by one and winks.

[*]

Once they're in the jailhouse, Sheriff Garland undoes Daryl's handcuffs, swings open a cell door, and waves him inside.

Daryl finally asks a question. "Can I see my wife first?"

"Not now. Later."

"How is she?"

"She's in good hands."

"Why're ya lockin' me up?"

"Because we don't _know_ you. Now get in."

Daryl walks inside the cell, and it clicks shut behind him. The sheriff turns the key in the lock. After Negan, Daryl swore to himself he'd never be put behind bars again, that he would go down fighting instead. But he can't do that, not with Carol in that infirmary, not with a possible life with her outside these bars.

Daryl plops himself down on the bench in the corner of his cell, which has nothing else but a pot to piss in and a bedroll.

The man in the other cell gets up and grips the bars. "Sheriff, when's my trial gonna be?"

The sheriff pauses at the jailhouse door and turns around. "We start in the morning. James will represent you. You should have a verdict by sunset tomorrow."

"What do you think the verdict's gonna be?"

"Well, I reckon it'll be guilty. They're your brothers. And we found the note you passed them with the lock pick wrapped inside. You _signed_ it, Daniel. With your own _name_."

"There wasn't a lock pick in that note! I'm innocent!" he exclaims, and then lowers his voice. "If they _do_ find me guilty, what do you think the sentence's gonna be?"

"Most likely banishment," the sheriff replies. "It's near treason."

"No! No, no…" Daniel shakes his head. "I didn't hurt anyone! They were _innocent_! My brothers were _innocent_ , and the jury sentenced them to hang! That woman is a lying slut!"

The sheriff paces back and hisses angrily into the cell: "That _girl_ is just sixteen years old. I was there when she was examined. She had bruises all over her thighs and neck. She almost died. And her innocence _did_ die." He draws back. "What's more, you've been smuggling goods out of the storehouse for over a week and burying them up the road, so your brothers could dig them up when they busted out."

"What, me? Nah! No way!"

"You drew a goddamn map, Daniel! On your note. Johnny's going to find the stash, if he hasn't already."

"I didn't know. I didn't know! They can't banish me! That's a _death_ sentence! You _know_ what it's like out there, alone with the cannibals!" Daniel continues to plead with the sheriff as he walks out of the jailhouse. Then the inmate throws himself in defeat down on the bench in his cell.

So _this_ is the man who was responsible for freeing the man who cut Carol. But Daryl can't let that anger get to him, because he needs to get information. He slides off the bench, walks to the bars that form the barrier between their two cells, and leans against them. "Hey," he hisses, and the inmate looks up. "They picked me up on the outside."

"So?" Daniel asks.

"Sounds like yer gonna be on the outside soon. 'N I got supplies buried out there," Daryl lies. "I can tell you where, if you tell me a few things 'bout this place."

The inmate glances toward the open door of the jailhouse and then back at Daryl. "What do you want to know?"


	20. Chapter 20

Daryl learns that the historic Jamestown Settlement was made into an emergency camp shortly after the Outbreak by a group of U.S. Navy men who survived the collapse. Most of those men died off in the first six months, clearing out what they call here "the cannibals," but Jamestown grew into a permanent camp under the leadership of the beast of a man Daryl met at the whorehouse - Captain John Smith.

"You got to be shittin' me!" Daryl exclaims. "That's really his name?"

"Ironic, huh?" Daniel asks.

That the guy who established this post-apocalyptic settlement has the same name as the guy who established colonial Jamestown? Daryl doesn't know that he'd call it _ironic_ , but it's a damn weird coincidence. _Too_ weird. The man probably made up his name, created a persona for himself, like King Ezekiel did.

"How many people ya got here?" Daryl asks.

"Including children? About 600."

 _Damn_. That's the biggest single camp Daryl's ever encountered. The Hilltop, the Kingdom, Alexandria, and Oceanside _combined_ don't have 600 people. There must be more people living in parts of the museum he didn't see.

"'N what about the sheriff?" Daryl asks. "Is he second in command?"

"Something like that," Daniel replies. The sheriff, he tells Daryl, used to be a Richmond City Police Department detective. He lost his first camp, wandered alone for months, and then found the Jamestown Settlement four years ago. He quickly rose in the ranks of leadership by virtue of his competence. "He's the captain's right-hand man."

"So they take in strangers here?" Daryl asks.

"After a trial period."

"Trial period?"

"First," Daniel tells him, "they take all your shit."

"Yeah, took mine."

"Whatever group brought you in gets to keep six tenths of your loot. But the captain _always_ gets a tenth, and three tenths always go to the storeroom for rationing to the community. Same thing for anything scavengers bring in. After they take all your shit, they interrogate you. They want to make sure you aren't dangerous, or that you aren't a spy for another camp that plans to take over. Then, if you pass the interrogation, you're on probation, not allowed to have any weapons for three months. And if you follow the rules, don't get into trouble, and haul your weight for those three months, you get to stay. You get your weapons back and your horse, if you came in with one. And your clothes. A tenth of your ammo. But not liquor or excess ammo or food or batteries. That's all been divided."

"And if ya just want to leave?" Daryl asks. "Do they give ya yer weapons and horses back 'n let ya go?"

"No one wants to leave."

"But if someone did?"

"If they did, that probably means they're spies from a camp somewhere else, and they'll be coming back with an army."

"'N why would ya think that?"

The inmate looks down at his hands and picks some dirt from beneath his fingernail. "Two and half years ago, they took in this man who came up to the iron gates with nothing but a pack and a rifle. A month later, he asked to leave. He said he just couldn't get used to settled life and a workday and rules. So they gave him his gun back and let him walk out the gates. Three days later, he came back with fifty armed men and women, by night. There was a raid."

A heavy weight settles in Daryl's gut. These people have every reason to distrust strangers, just like Alexandria does. They aren't going to let him and Carol go, are they?

"We responded quickly," Daniel says. "I guess they thought they had the advantage of surprise, but we had numbers. We put them _all_ down before they could kill more than fifteen of ours. Well, the captain kept one man alive. Tortured him to find out where their camp was, and then sent the sheriff and the cavalry to make sure there weren't more coming after us."

"'N then what?" Daryl asks.

"The sheriff found the camp. There weren't many people left in it. Every able-bodied adult had come out for the raid. They left behind a couple of old people, two pregnant women, and a bunch of children."

"'N what'd yer people do to 'em?"

It's always a question…how to deal with surrendered enemies. Daryl's people had to deal with it when it came to the Saviors. Daryl doesn't fault Oceanside for killing the men who killed their men, but he's not sorry he let Dwight go, and he's glad now that they were able to incorporate some of the Saviors into their camps.

"The sheriff convinced the captain to take them all in to Jamestown."

"'S why ya have that orphanage in the museum?" Daryl asks.

"Yeah. The raid left some orphans of our own, too. We just thought it was easier to house them all together. The whole town looks out for them, and they look out for each other."

Daryl scratches his cheek. "The captain…he didn't want to take 'em in?"

"Not at first. He was afraid the kids were going to grow up and want revenge, or that those two women who lost their husbands would kill men in their sleep. But now…both of those women have married men here. And the kids, well, they like it here. It's better than where they came from. They were going hungry. And some of the men in that camp, they were pretty brutal."

 _Like yer brothers?_ Daryl thinks, but he doesn't dare say it. The thought does lead him to another question: "What kind of things they give the death penalty for here?"

"Rape sometimes. Murder always. And treason."

"Treason?" Daryl asks.

"One of the whores helped let those raiders in, because she fell in love with the spy while he was here. She wanted his people to win, wanted him to become the new captain. She thought she'd be Governess of Jamestown or some shit. She was tried and then executed for treason."

"Y'all don't have elections?" Daryl asks. "The captain's just always the captain?"

"Yep."

"And he's the one decides everything? Makes all the rules?" Daryl wants to know who will be deiciding his fate, who he has to convince to let them go.

"Well, he has men who advise him."

"The sheriff?" Daryl asks.

"And a few others. But the sheriff has the most influence over him."

"How often people get executed?" Daryl wants to know how violent the populace is, if rape, murder, and treason are common occurrences.

"If you count my brothers? Five in the three years I've been here." That's not too terribly many, Daryl thinks, in a camp of 600, in the brutal world they live in. It's three more than the Hilltop has executed in twice that many years, but the Hilltop is a tiny camp by comparison. "I should never have helped my brothers escape. Now I'll be a dead man out there." Daniel looks anxiously at Daryl. "Where'd you bury your stuff?"

[*]

The jailhouse is blanketed in a patchwork quilt of black and gray shadows because the sun has nearly set. Daniel snores in the cell beside him, maybe because there's nothing better to do than sleep. For the last hour, Daryl's paced the short length of his own dirt floor, done fifty push-ups, tested the strength of the bars with shaking, even tried to use the prong of his belt to pick the lock – not because he's going to escape, but because he just wants to know if he _can_.

He can't.

He puts his belt back on and sits down on the bench with a sigh. Three minutes later, a lantern glows in the shadowy doorway. A man enters and sets the lantern on the small wooden desk in the jailhouse, along with a tin plate covered in food. It's Sheriff Garland, but without his Stetson hat this time. His wavy brown hair is thick against his brow, and without the white hat, in the light of the oil lamp, his eyes look a little more blue than gray. "When did you last eat?" he asks Daryl.

"'Round noon."

"I brought you a little something." Sheriff Garland opens Daryl's cell door and extends him the plate. It's topped with a handful of raw spinach, a small piece of cornbread, and a two-ounce filet of lukewarm fish. Daryl devours it greedily with his hands. He wonders if Carol's been fed, if she got the same thing, or if they fed her more because of all the blood she lost.

Daniel has stirred awake. "What about me?"

"Earl will bring you your super shortly." Sheriff Garland extends a tin cup of water to Daryl, which he downs.

"Since it's my last meal," Daniel asks, "can I have something nice?"

"It's not your last meal. You'll have plenty of meals on the outside, if you're smart."

When Daryl's done eating, the sheriff orders him to stand, turn around, and put his hands behind his back. Daryl complies and feels the cuffs tighten onto his wrists.

"Can I see m'wife?" he asks as the sheriff takes hold of the oil lamp on the desk.

"Not now. Later."

"'S what you said the last time."

The sheriff doesn't reply. Instead, he leads Daryl by lantern light out the jailhouse door. The sky glows dark purple in the wake of the setting sun. The blacksmith's shop is silent, the butcher gone, and the school house empty. Smoke puffs through chimneys in the cabins they pass, and he can hear live music drifting through the open window of one – guitar and violin.

"How is she?" Daryl asks. "M'wife?"

"She's in good hands."

Daryl's starting to worry about the lack of information. What if Carol's dead, and they just aren't telling him because they want him to believe his cooperation is keeping her alive?

They pass a cabin where a small boy half hangs out the open window. His skin is the same light black shade as RJ's back in Alexandria, and he can't be much more than two. "Hi, Daddy!" he shouts.

"What are you standing on?" the sheriff calls back.

"Nufffing!" the toddler cries proudly.

"How'd you climb up there?"

"Wocking chair!"

"Where's Grandmama?"

The boy's face disappears from the window and is replaced by that of an old lady. "I've got him, Garland!"

The sheriff sighs and walks on.

Outside the old settlement fence, the fields they pass are vacant, and the ships sit by the dock, swaying gently as the water laps. Candles flicker in the windows of the cabins of all three ships, and an oil lamp glows on the deck of one, the _Godspeed_ , where five men sit playing cards at a wooden table.

"Evenin', Sheriff!" one of them calls down. "Join us for some poker later?"

"Don't think so. Not tonight."

"I was hoping you'd bet me some of that whiskey we heard you and the posse scored."

The sheriff waves over his shoulder and walks on without further comment.

"Where we goin'?" Daryl ventures to ask.

"To see the captain," the sheriff replies.

The interrogation, Daryl supposes, is about to begin.


	21. Chapter 21

When they walk through the museum, the orphans are in their beds. Electric lamps glow on three nightstands. A faint wisp of electric heat floats from the ceiling. It feels about sixty-five degrees in here, instead of the nighttime fifty it is outside. Daryl wonders if there's power in the entire museum.

The youngest children are already asleep beneath their covers. Two of the older ones sit cross-legged on a top bunk playing checkers, and they're passing back and forth one of Daryl and Carol's giant pixie sticks. Three more empty, colorful straws rest in a trashcan. "Hey, my turn!" says a boy in the bunk below them, who slides out of bed and reaches up for the straw.

Two more kids lie stomach down on their beds flipping through comic books. A boy, who looks to be about thirteen, quickly tucks a _Playboy_ magazine under his pillow as they pass by his bunk.

Sheriff Garland stops walking. "You kids were supposed to save that candy for tomorrow."

"Sorry, sir," one of the kids says.

"Did the little ones who are asleep even get any?"

"It'll just rot their teeth," replies one of the checker-playing boys.

"Is Nanny gone?"

"She turned in," the boy who hid the _Playboy_ answers.

"See the lights are out in half an hour, then."

"Yes, sir."

Little Terrence is on his bed with his baseball cards neatly spread out, as if he's organizing them. "Sheriff," he asks as they pass, his voice small and quiet. "Did you tell the captain? About me skipping school again this morning?"

Sheriff Garland chuckles. "No, young man, I did not. But I assure you the captain doesn't care about those kinds of trivial infractions."

Relief washes over the young boy's face.

"School is for your own good, you know," the sheriff tells him.

"Yes, sir."

They exit the room, walk through a darkened area of the museum, and then toward a light in the "museum offices" hallway. The captain sits at his desk now, with Daryl's bottle of whiskey opened and an ounce poured in a glass.

Garland walks Daryl in and forces him to sit down in the chair across from the captain's desk. Daryl has to sit forward slightly so he doesn't lean back against his cuffed hands.

Garland closes the door and sits in the chair next to Daryl's. A white-and-black, U.S. Navy dress service cap rests atop a haphazard stack of files on the desk. The captain, who somehow looks like an even bigger man when sitting, picks up the whiskey bottle and pours an ounce into a second, empty glass. He pushes the glass across the desk to Sheriff Garland, who thanks him and picks it up. "Cheers on your find, Gar," the captain says, raising his glass, "even if you lost the horse."

Garland clinks his glass, sips, and hisses.

"But this is _all_ we're drinking," the captain insists, pointing with one finger to the bottle. "Because that's at least two blow jobs, three titty fucks, and one good pussy pounding right there." He lets out a bark of a laugh.

Garland looks slightly annoyed and says, "You ever feel like you're taking advantage of their addiction?"

A scowl darkens the captain's face. "I _feel_ like I'm allowing them to serve a productive role in our society."

"Productive?"

"Very productive, Gar. Men outnumber women two to one at Jamestown, and they get restless if they can't find an outlet. And restless men do desperate things. We can't all be so lucky as to find ourselves a war bride."

 _War bride?_ Daryl's mind churns around the term. If he'd heard it before talking to that inmate, he might think Jamestown raided other camps and took the women as unwilling captives. But that doesn't seem likely to him, given that they execute for rape. The sheriff's "war bride" is most likely one of the two pregnant women who was left behind in the camp that raided Jamestown, which would explain why the boy who called him _daddy_ looked nothing like him.

"Do you ever feel you're taking advantage of _her_?" the captain asks.

"Of my _wife_?" replies the sheriff, with a sharp edge to his voice.

"Well, why do you think she married you, Gar?" A low chuckle rumbles in the captain's throat. "For _love_? She was pregnant, and she needed a provider for her child, for herself, and for that old, nagging mother of hers. She was in a new place, and she was frightened, and she wanted the nice sheriff to protect her. It's just a different kind of prostitution."

Out of the corner of his eye, Daryl watches the sheriff's reaction. A line jumps in the man's jaw, and his eyes darken just enough that the last of the blue seems to vanish from the gray. But he remains silent.

"Besides," the captain continues, "those ladies in the brothel are free to stop offering their services anytime and to go to work farming in the fields or cleaning fish on the docks. But they don't _want_ to. Now _that's_ dirty work!" The captain laughs again, like a thunderclap. "Hell, Gar, don't you wish _you_ could make a living fucking? I sure as shit do."

Garland takes another small, silent sip of his whiskey.

The captain finally focuses his attention on Daryl. "Where are you from?" His voice is friendly, almost jovial. It has a natural rumble to it, but not the intimidating boom Daryl expected from an interrogation.

"Ain't from nowhere."

"Where's your permanent camp?"

Daryl sticks to the story he and Carol agreed they would tell if they ever ran into strangers. "Don't have no permanent camp. Just been wanderin'."

"Why didn't you have any camping gear, then?" the captain asks. "Tents?"

"Got sleepin' bags. 'S all we need. Find places to stay."

"For how long have you been wandering?"

"Since the start."

"Where'd you find the booze?"

"In houses," Daryl answers. "In a winery. And 'n a bar."

The captain looks at Garland. "I saw where the wine was from. On the label. I thought to look it up on a map." He taps a finger on his forehead and smiles as though proud of his ingenuity. "That winery is over two hundred miles from here. Too far for some supply runner or spy to bother traveling in this day and age. He might be telling the truth."

Sheriff Garland sips his whiskey slowly, and Daryl thinks maybe they're going to buy his not-from-anywhere story. But then the sheriff lowers his glass to his knee, and without even looking at Daryl, coolly asks, "How do you have horses that are so well shoed, so _freshly_ shoed?"

 _Oh shit._

"It looks like they've been shoed within the last three weeks," Sheriff Garland finally turns his gray eyes to Daryl. "If you don't have a camp, and you don't have a blacksmith, how on earth did you manage that?"

"Grew up on a farm," Daryl lies. "Know how to shoe a damn horse. Can find horses shoes lyin' round barns easy."

"And do you know how to tan leather, too?" Sheriff Garland asks. "Because one of your saddles was at least a decade old, but the other one looks like it was handmade sometime in the last four years."

"I can tan leather," Daryl says, and that, at least, is not a lie. "Can hunt. Tan a hide. Tan any damn thing."

"And stich saddle bags, too, I suppose," Garland says casually, before taking another small sip of his whiskey. He sets the glass again on his knee. "With an electric sewing machine. A sewing machine that did not appear to be anywhere among your supplies."

Carol made those saddle bags in the Kingdom, using one of the three sewing machines in their seamstress shop. "Looted them bags from a store," Daryl lies.

"A store that sews together saddle bags using old quilts?" Garland asks skeptically.

Daryl shrugs. "Ya know. That novelty shit they sell in them old town stores."

"One of those boutiques," the captain says, nodding and raising his glass, "where everything costs five times as much as it should."

"Yeah," Daryl agrees. "'Zactly."

"It's plausible." The captain turns his hazel eyes from Daryl to Garland. "Don't you think?"

"No."

Daryl can't figure out if they're playing good cop / bad cop or if the captain is just that much less perceptive than the sheriff.

"You think he's lying?" the captain asks.

"Oh, I _know_ he's lying," Garland replies.

The calm, self-assured way Garland says that rattles Daryl's resolve more than a punch in the face could have. "Look," Daryl says, because he's sure there's no way he's going to be able to convince the sheriff he didn't come out of _some_ camp recently, "A'ight. Was in a camp once. In Charlottesville. At Monticello. But we ain't in that camp no more. Left three weeks ago 'cause food was runnin' out and people was getting' sick. 'N we shoed the horses 'fore we left."

When the lie is out, Daryl senses he's just dug a deeper hole than the one he was trying to climb out of. He never should have said a word. When they question Carol, she's going to have to play along with a lie she didn't even know he told. Maybe they already _have_ questioned Carol. Maybe that's why the sheriff left him in that cell for so long and wouldn't tell him anything. And maybe when they questioned her, she told them a different story.

What has he done?

The captain, with his elbows on the desk, leans his massive frame forward. He raises one bushy, black eyebrow. "Then why did you lie and tell us you weren't from a camp?"

"'Cause I don't want ya raidin' Monticello."

"We don't _raid_ camps," the captain says indignantly. "I run an honorable operation here! And we certainly aren't bothering to travel that damn far." He sits back and looks at Garland. "He could be telling the truth. He sure doesn't _look_ like he's been living in a camp recently. He looks like he hasn't had a bath in weeks."

Daryl just washed up in the creek two days ago. Why's everyone always saying he looks like he never bathes? But at least it's working to his advantage here. They just might buy his revised story after all.

Sheriff Garland quietly finishes his last sip of whiskey. "No," he says as he sets his empty glass down with a light clink on the metal office desk. "Their camp isn't in Monticello. It's near Washington, D.C."

 _Shit._

 _How the fuck does he know that?_

 _If he hurt Carol to get that information…if he so much as laid a finger on her –_

"How the fuck do you know that?" the captain asks.

Garland opens his light brown, suede vest, reaches into an inside pocket, and pulls out Carol's map, the one she's been using to plot their journey. But they didn't _mark_ those maps. It's not as if they circled their camp on it.

"They've been tracing their route on this map with their fingertips," Garland says. "I was able to pick up the residue by dusting with cocoa powder. It made a rather distinct line." He spreads open the map to reveal their routes plotted out in dark black ink.

"That doesn't look like cocoa powder," the captain says.

Garland closes his eyes briefly, and then opens them. "No, John. That's ink from a fountain pen. After I saw the routes, I brushed off the powder and marked them."

"Oh."

That's when Daryl decides it isn't a routine. The captain is just that dense. Daryl has trouble believing he ever got promoted to the rank of captain in the U.S. Navy and again wonders if he created his own backstory.

"You've come a long way," Garland tells Daryl. "And we want to know why. Just tell us the truth, if you want us to trust you, if you seek peace with us."

And what if Daryl _does_ tell the truth? Tells them that he and Carol were…what? _On vacation_? That they left a safe and well-defended home and travelled hundreds of miles in search of Carol's family roots? If they think he's lying _now_ , they sure as hell are going to think he's lying when he tells the truth.

Unfortunately, the truth may be the only card he has left to play. So Daryl plays it. He doesn't mention the Hilltop, Alexandria, or Oceanside, and he doesn't offer any details about the Kingdom, but he gives a basic outline of the truth. He tells them his camp knows nothing about Jamestown and would not mean it any harm if they did. He and Carol were only coming here, Daryl assures them, to trace Carol's family roots, to find out about her great-great-great grandfather, who was presumably one of the original inhabitants of colonial Jamestown.

And when the card is played, Daryl steadies himself. His muscles tighten in preparation for his captor's response, and he slowly raises his eyes to the captain's.


	22. Chapter 22

The captain's belly shakes. The man is laughing so hard his face has begun to turn reddish-blue. He sucks in breaths between great bursts of laughter. While the captain laughs explosively, Sheriff Garland doesn't even crack a smile. He's just been looking silently at Daryl this entire time.

The captain's laugh trails off into a titter. "Do you believe this bullshit, Gar!" he shouts. "Do you believe this web of nonsense this asshole's spinning?"

"Possibly."

The captain coughs. One last laugh splutters out his mouth, and then he asks. "What?"

"I think I might," Garland says.

"But it's absurd!" the captain roars.

"Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction," Garland replies. "And it's the only thing that makes sense of all the evidence. It's clear they _have_ an established camp, given the nature of the horse shoes and the saddle and the saddle bag. It's clear they've been on some kind of road trip, based on the map and the things in their saddle bags. There was a brochure for some historical house in Dumfries. Souvenirs from Monticello. A grave rubbing from a tombstone in Staunton and even a page torn out of a ledger of names of wounded Civil War soldiers. Maybe she really _is_ tracing her roots."

"Who the fuck does such a thing!" the captain laugh-yells. "Leaves the safety of walls and gardens for a road trip to research some long dead _ancestors_?"

Garland looks Daryl up and down. "A man who's in love, I imagine. But why _she_ wanted to do it is a mystery to me."

"Remarkable," the captain says, and claps his hands together and laughs. "Abso-fucking-loutely remarkable!" The captain slams the desk excitedly with his fist, and a pencil rolls off its edge onto the floor. "Good Lord, Gar! He must have wanted to get laid something awful to follow a woman hundreds of miles in search of her _roots_. Especially when a man can always find a way to buy it."

Garland sighs. "Not every man _wants_ to buy it, John."

"They're a lot of trouble if you ask me. Wives and girlfriends. Can't imagine why any man would want one. They're always…" The captain moves his hand open and closed, open and closed, "Jibber jabbing. Nagging. Wanting flowers. Asking you to take them on road trips!" he roars. "Ahhhhhh Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha!" He pounds out the last of his laughter on the desk with his fist. Then he turns to Garland. "What's she look like? Have you seen her? She must have huge tits. What is she, late twenties?"

Daryl's muscles wind like coils.

"She's his age," Garland says, and Daryl's anger at the captain is partially supplanted by his relief that the sheriff is using the _present tense_ to speak of Carol. "Maybe a little older. Not unattractive." Not unattractive? Daryl thinks. Carol's _beautiful_.

There's a knock on the closed office door, and the captain raises one hand and waves it in a _come-in_ gesture. The door swings open, and a man with a rifle on his shoulder pops his head in. "Sheriff," he says, "may I speak to you for a moment?"

The sheriff rises and vanishes into the hallway and the door clicks shut.

The captain pours himself another ounce of whiskey and raises the glass. "I guess I can have just one more," he tells Daryl. "I suppose I'll just have to rub this one out myself." He throws the whiskey back, drinking half of it down with a hiss, and then sets the glass on the desk and pounds his chest. "Whoo-wee! That'll put hair on your chest. Not that I need anymore on mine."

Daryl eyes him warily, wondering how a man so crass and stupid got to be in charge of this place. Was it just a first come, first lead sort of thing? Or did he do something so heroic at one point that everyone feels indebted to him? Are they intimidated by his sheer size and brute strength? Or is he just innocuous enough and easily enough led that no one bothers to try to supplant him? To avoid a conflict, does the sheriff just let the captain _think_ he's in charge?

The sheriff pokes his head back in the door. "Do you know your blood type?" he asks Daryl.

"No. Why?"

"Because I'm getting tired of my wife being milked."

"What?" Daryl asks.

"Come with me." The sheriff walks in and pulls him up from the chair.

"Where do you think you're taking him?" the captain asks.

"I know you're going to be busy tonight," Garland says as he gestures to the whiskey bottle. "You did an excellent job getting what we needed out of him for now, so I figured I'd take him off your hands. I thought we could confer about what to do with the foreigners in the morning?"

"Good, good," the captain says. "But not before ten a.m. Don't wake me before ten!"

"Yes, Captain."

Garland leads Daryl down the hallway and past another office that looks like it's been converted into a bedroom. The door is open and the overhead light is on. Sheriff Garland sighs and turns the light off. This is the Captain's bedroom, Daryl supposes.

Next they turn a corner and pass a breakroom, which also has an overhead light on. Several small kitchen appliances litter the counter, including a toaster oven, a crockpot, and an electric kettle. The faint hum of a refrigerator reaches Daryl's ears as Garland drags him inside to turn the overhead light off. In the darkness that follows, the light on a coffee maker glows red. The coffee pot has about an ounce of now thick, brown sludge in the bottom. Garland walks to the counter and clicks the coffee pot off before returning to Daryl.

They pass a third office, which has the blinds pulled closed, and then near the man who popped his head in the captain's office. He sits in a chair in the hallway, with his rifle across his knees, as if standing guard. Across from him is an open doorway. A blue sign with a red cross protrudes from the wall. The museum apparently had a nurse's office in case visitors or employees were injured.

When they walk in the lit room, and Daryl sees Carol, his heart thuds. She lies on one of two beds, with a sheet and blanket pulled to her waist. She's been stripped of her shirt, but not her bra. Her eyes are closed, and she looks so pale and weak that Daryl's breath catches. A fresh bandage covers her side where she was cut, and a blood-filled tube runs from a vein in one of her arms to a bag on a stand. Another tube runs from that bag to a vein in the arm of another woman, who is half sitting up in the second bed near Carol's. This woman is probably in her early thirties, with curly red hair and bright green eyes.

"'S wrong with m'wife?" Daryl asks anxiously.

A dark-skinned man who can't be more than five foot five, and who wears a white lab coat, turns from squeezing drops of something into a tray on the counter. "I'm Dr. Ahmad," he says. "Do you know your blood type?"

Daryl shakes his head. "'S wrong with her?" he asks again.

"She was stabbed," the doctor replies impatiently.

"Know, but…why's she all hooked up?" It's been at least two hours since they got here.

"She lost a lot of blood," Dr. Ahmad replies. "Her wound started bleeding again on the ride here. We had to stop the bleeding, clean the wound, stitch her up, blood type her, and then go around asking people if they were a match." He gestures to the redheaded woman. "Shannon's been at this for a while now."

"I'm O negative," the pretty redheaded says. "Universal donor. I can give blood to anyone."

"Thank ya," Daryl tells her. "Thank ya for doin' this for 'er."

"Not a problem, sugar. What's your name?"

"Daryl."

"I'm Shannon. I suppose you've met my husband Garland?"

Daryl glances at Garland, who has leaned back against the window of the office and crossed his arms over his chest.

"But she probably shouldn't give any more," Dr. Ahmad says as he walks over and begins capping off the tubes. "Not tonight. So we need someone else with either A negative or O negative blood." He slides the needle from Shannon's arm. "We'll type you and see if you're a match." He gives Shannon a cotton ball and tells her to hold her arm up for a moment. "Do you have any STDs?" he asks Daryl. "HIV, syphilis – "

"- Nah, no."

"Have you ever had sex with a man?"

"Hell no!"

"Prostitutes?" the doctor asks.

Daryl swallows. He's not quite sure how to answer that. Merle paid that woman he lost his virginity to, but Daryl didn't know his brother had done that. He feels hot in the face, ashamed, and afraid of being unable to help Carol.

"In the last fifteen years?" the doctor clarifies.

"Nah. No."

"Hold out your arms."

Garland steps forward, undoes Daryl's handcuffs, and then returns to his spot against the window. The doctor examines Daryl's arms.

"What ya lookin' for?" Daryl asks.

"Track marks."

"Never did that shit."

The doctor continues to ask him questions while he wraps a bandage around Shannon's arm. Then he walks back over to Daryl and says, "Give me your index finger."

Daryl holds out his finger, and the doctor pricks it with some sharp tool. He then guides Daryl over to the counter, turns his finger, and squeezes a drop of blood into each of several circles of liquid on a tray.

"This'll tell m' blood type?" Daryl asks.

"Yes."

"How soon?"

"Ten to twenty minutes," the doctor answers.

"What happens if I ain't got the right kind?" Daryl asks nervously after the doctor finishes squeezing a drop into the last circle and hands him a small piece of gauze to hold on his fingertip.

"Well, this is our last kit," the doctor says. "We can't type anyone else."

"So what happens, then, if I ain't a match?" Daryl asks frantically.

"Then I'll drink some more juice," Shannon says, "and eat a slice of my mother's fine strawberry cobbler. I'll rest an hour, and then Dr. Ahmad will hook me right up again."

"You've given a lot already, Shannon," Garland says. "The doctor doesn't advise that."

"Baby," she says, "it's self-replenishing. What's the worse that happens? I faint?"

"Is there really no one else on record with either A negative or O negative?" Garland asks.

"Thomas went and asked everyone he could find," Shannon replies. "Most of them don't know their type, and those that did weren't a match. Now, the _captain_ has O negative, but with all the whoring he does, you know we don't want _him_ doing _this_."

Dr. Ahmad switches out an empty bag on the stand, which has a tube leading to Carol's other arm, with another bag of clear liquid.

"'S that?" Daryl asks.

"Saline drip."

"IV fluid," Shannon explains to Daryl. "Since she can't drink anything right now."

"It will hydrate her and expand the volume of blood briefly," the doctor explains. He walks over to check on the blood type test.

Daryl looks across Shannon's bed to Carol.

"You can go give your wife a kiss, honey," Shannon says. "Don't be shy."

Daryl glances at Garland, to make sure a move won't be taken as a threat, and the sheriff nods, so he walks around the back of Shannon's bed and then between them until he's at the top of Carol's bed. He bends down and kisses her forehead. Her brow feels slick with sweat and slightly warm. "She's just sleepin'?" he asks.

"I gave her a mild sedative," the doctor says. "It knocked her out, but it's for the best."

Daryl starts to pull the blanket up over Carol to her neck, to warm her and give her some dignity since they've taken off her shirt, and that's when he notices she's only in her underwear below, too.

"Why ya take her pants off?" He tries not bark the question, but maybe he does, because the doctor looks affronted.

"Because blood seeped all over them," the doctor says defensively. "And down inside them. We had to clean her up."

"Mhmh," Daryl murmurs apologetically.

"Why don't you pull up a chair," Shannon suggests. "Garland, baby, get Daryl a chair so he can sit next to his wife."

Garland looks at her curiously, but he does bring over a chair for Daryl, which he places between Shannon's bed and Carol's. Shannon swivels out of her bed and attempts to stand, but swoons. Garland catches her by the arms as her knees buckle. "Jesus," the sheriff mutters, "Don't try to get up so soon." He helps her back into bed. "I guess we're not splitting that bottle of wine tonight."

"Well, maybe we should," Shannon replies. "With so little blood in me to soak it up, you just might get lucky for a change."

The sheriff doesn't look amused by her joke. He turns to the doctor. "Is there juice for her?"

"In a travel mug in the fridge in the breakroom. It should be defrosted by now."

Garland leaves to get it and Shannon asks Daryl, "What's your wife's name?"

"Carol."

"Carol. I had a sister named Carol. How long have you two been together?"

"Uh…"

"Married, I mean?"

Carol said to say they were married. She didn't say how long. He smooths his fingers gently over Carol's brow. "Hard to tell."

"Ah, one of those apocalyptic marriages. They just kind of happen. One day you're just surviving together, and the next you're married, and you're not quite sure when it happened. That's how it went with my first husband. Well, my second. My first post-apocalyptic husband, I mean. Garland's technically number three. But they say the third time's a charm."

She falls silent for a while and Garland eventually returns with the juice. Shannon sips from the mug. "See," she tells her husband. "I get an extra treat for my trouble." She turns toward Daryl. "You're wife's going to be just fine. Garland survived a knife wound once, didn't you, baby?"

"Mhm," Garland murmurs.

"One of my people gave it to him when they tried to take over this place," she continues, "but he didn't hold that against me. Somehow he fell in love with me anyway." She glances at Daryl. "It probably sounds strange to you, doesn't it, a man falling in love with a woman from a warring camp?"

"Pffft. Nah. Seen it happen a time or two."

"Why? Did your camp ever go to war and take in the surrendered?"

Shannon asks the question so innocently that Daryl replies without thinking, "Yeah, each community took in some."

 _Shit._ As soon as the words are out he realizes his mistake.

"Each community?" Shannon asks just as innocently. "How big is your alliance?"

 _Shit._

Negan starved him for days in that cell, stripped him naked, tortured him with music, and still couldn't break him, couldn't get him to say one desired word. And then this smooth sheriff and his cheerful wife drag all this information out of him in under thirty minutes? _How the hell did he let that happen?_

Daryl keeps his lips tightly closed.

"Well, I suppose you're like Garland," says Shannon. "A man of few words."

Daryl's cursing himself for his stupidity when Dr. Ahmad says, "The results are in."


	23. Chapter 23

"What'm I?" Daryl asks anxiously.

"Congratulations!" the doctor replies. "You're A negative. Let's hook you up."

"I guess that's my cue to get out of this bed," Shannon says, and starts to swivel one leg out.

"Stay there!" Garland orders her. He goes to the corner of the room and picks up a folded wheelchair, which he flops open and rolls to her.

"Oh, you're not putting me in that," Shannon insists.

"Would you prefer I carry you over my shoulder like a caveman? Because God knows you aren't walking all the way back to our cabin."

"Oh fine. I'll use the damn wheelchair."

Garland helps his wife into the wheelchair and, as he leaves, reminds Daryl, "There's an armed guard just outside this door. I'll be back as soon as I get her settled."

 **[*]**

Blood flows from Daryl's vein into a bag and then into Carol's vein. "Think it's stuck," Daryl says.

The doctor comes over, fiddles with the tubes, and the blood starts flowing again.

Carol stirs a few minutes later when the doctor removes the needle from her arm and wraps a bandage around the insertion point. She looks frantically around, until her eyes settle on Daryl and relief and recognition seep into them.

When the doctor goes over to the medicine cabinet to get something, Daryl slips out of bed, puts a hand on her shoulder, leans down, and frantically whispers, "They found out we come from near D.C. and got more'n one camp. Told 'em we's married. Told 'em we left to trace yer roots. Told 'em our people ain't interested in their camp." He wants to make sure they have their stories straight.

He pulls abruptly away when the doctor returns to Carol's bedside. Daryl doesn't feel at all dizzy, unlike that other woman, but maybe the doc took less blood from him, or maybe it's just because Shannon was petite, like Carol. Or maybe she was just playing the frail woman to earn Daryl's sympathy and get him to say more.

After the doctor shines a light in Carol's eyes, checks her temperature, asks her a few questions to judge her mental with-it-ness, and removes her saline drip, he leaves to go fetch her some apple juice and some food.

"Guard right outside the door," Daryl whispers as soon as the doctor's gone. "Probably can't hear us from here."

Carol takes this opportunity to ask, in a low voice, hastily, "Where are we and what do you know?"

Daryl speaks hurriedly, in short staccato fragments, to convey as much as he can as quickly as he can. "Jamestown. 600 people. Captain's in charge in name. Think Sheriff might _really_ be in charge. Man ya killed was an escaped fugitive. Rapist. Sheriff was after 'em. Ain't upset he's dead. Had to tell them half the truth. Now they know we're from D.C. 'n there's at least two camps, but 's all they know. Sorry." He feels guilty for saying too much to the sheriff and his wife and thinks Carol wouldn't have slipped up so easily. Daryl can withstand a beating, but Carol's better with subtle stuff.

"This sheriff," she asks. "What's your read?"

"Seems honorable, but he's a smart fucker. Can't slip one by 'em. His wife, too, the one gave ya her blood 'fore I did." Carol glances up at the empty blood bags. "Ya lost a lot. Her name's Shannon. Be careful what ya say 'round either of 'em."

"And the captain?"

"Dumb ass."

"600?"

Daryl nods.

"How many warriors?"

"Dunno. Posse had eight men. Saw three armed watchmen in stands spread out 'long the highway. Use a flag relay to communicate. Seen two guards at the front gate, a night patrolman wanderin' the settlement, 'n that guard in the hallway. But I'm sure there's lots more could fight. Jamestown put down a raid of fifty men a couple years ago. Sneak night attack, led by someone they took in 'n later let go. He had inside help from a whore slippin' in."

"A whore?" asks Carol, sounding surprised at his language. If Daryl wants to be derogatory toward a woman, _dumb bitch_ is usually his favored word choice. She's probably never even heard him say _whore_.

"Got a brothel here," he explains.

"You're kidding?"

"'Cause of that raid, they're wary of people who show up 'n later wanna leave."

"How'd you learn all this?"

"From m' cell mate. They had me locked up."

"Did they hurt you?" she asks with alarm, and then lowers her voice back to a whisper when he answers no. "How heavily armed are they?"

"Ain't seen a single working man or woman without knives or machetes. Lots have handguns on their belts, too. Wouldn't be surprised if everyone's got a rifle back in their rooms."

"And what do you think they'll do with us?" Carol asks.

"Don't think they're gonna hurt us if we don't try to hurt no one. But don't know if they believe the whole tracin' yer roots story yet. Captain doesn't. Sherriff mostly does. Might need to lay low 'til - " He falls silent because the doctor's back.

Dr. Ahmad has brought Carol a tray with apple juice, water, a large piece of cornbread, and several strawberries. "Help her sit up slowly," he tells Daryl, who does after fiddling with the raiseable bed. Carol swoons for a moment as she tries to get in a sitting position. "Eat and drink slowly," the doctor insists. "And stop if you feel nauseous."

"Thank you," Carol says. "For your help, thank you."

"It's my job," the doctor replies.

Daryl sits in the chair beside Carol while she eats, with a hand resting on the blanket that covers her knee. They don't say anything else because the doctor is within ear shot, at least not anything important. Carol says, "This cornbread is good. Do they grow corn here?"

"One acre of it," the doctor replies, which makes it clear to them that he can hear every word. "And the strawberries were plentiful this year."

By the time the doctor takes Carol's tray away, Sheriff Garland has returned. He glances at Carol, reaches up to tip his hat to her, and then seems to realize he's not wearing it. "Glad to see you conscious, ma'am. I'm Sheriff Garland Taylor. And you're….?"

"Carol Dixon."

Her unexpected use of his name sets the nerves in Daryl's fingertips to tingling. He's not sure why he likes the sound of it on her so much. It's never been a name he's been proud of, but she says it almost like it _is_ something to be proud of. Of course she's just playing. They aren't really married.

"Daryl told me your wife donated her blood to me," Carol continues. "Would you please tell her thank you for me?"

"I will indeed, ma'am." The sheriff slides his handcuffs off his belt and motions to Daryl. "Stand up and turn around."

"We really got to do the cuffs?" Daryl asks. "I ain't tried to hurt no one."

"It's protocol when leading an uncleared foreigner through the settlement."

"What's an _uncleared_ foreigner?" Carol asks in that sweet, clueless voice she used in Alexandria.

"Someone we've not yet approved for probationary admission."

Carol lays a hand on the blanket that covers her stomach. "Probationary admission? That's such a big word. I'm sorry I don't know what that means."

"It's a four-month trial period, before an individual can be granted full admission to the community."

"Full - "

"- Full admission means you get your horses and weapons back, you're allowed to scavenge and work on the outside, and you receive surplus rations instead of just sustinence rations."

Carol barely looks at Daryl, but she turns her eyes just enough that he can guess what she's thinking. If worst comes to worse, they ought to find a way to gain full admission. Because then one day, when they're working on "the outside," they can just slip away home.

The sheriff swirls his finger to indicate Daryl should turn around, and he complies and feels the cool steel of the cuffs on his wrist.

"Where are you taking him?" Carol asks with feigned fright, because she already knows they've had him in a cell.

"Back to his cell. Uncleared foreigners have to be kept apart. I'm sorry, ma'am, but it's protocol."

"Can't he _please_ just stay here tonight?" Carol asks softly. "There's another bed, and I get so scared alone at night." She's putting on the innocent housewife routine that worked so well in Alexandria.

It doesn't work on the sheriff. "Ma'am, you just traveled three hundred miles on horseback through a landscape riddled with cannibals. You survived a very ugly stab wound, and you successfully killed a man while you were bleeding out. I don't believe for one second you get scared at night."

Carol's face morphs almost instantly from innocence to mature resignation. She sighs through her nose. "Can I at least see him in the morning?"

"I'll bring him back for breakfast," the sheriff assures her.

Daryl, with his hands cuffed behind his back, bends down to kiss Carol on the lips. She's responds for a moment, and then puts a fingertip on his chin to tilt his head so she can press her lips against his ear. She kisses him there as an excuse to whisper, and he thinks she's going to whisper some warning about their situation, but instead she whispers, "I love you, too."

[*]

The iron door of the cell squeals shut, and the key clicks in the lock.

"She didn't marry ya just to provide 'n protect," Daryl says as the sheriff walks away.

Garland turns back. "What now?"

"Yer wife. Captain's full of shit. What he said back 'n that office, 'bout why she married ya. Ain't true. Plain as day she loves ya." He's hoping to ingratiate himself with this man, because he's the one most likely to be gracious with them.

"No, the captain's right. She married me because she was frightened and seven months pregnant, and I offered to take care of her and the baby and her mother. I wanted sex, companionship, and help around the house. She wanted security. And that's all our marriage was at first, a mutually beneficial exchange. But that's not all it is now." Garland hangs the cell keys on a hook by the jailhouse entryway. "Get some sleep. I'll be back in the morning to take you to have breakfast with your woman."

"Ya gonna question her now?" Daryl asks.

"Yes."

"Man, let 'er rest."

"I'm talking to her before you do." The sheriff doesn't know they were left alone by the doctor long enough to talk already. "I won't hurt her, though. But I think you've figured that out by now."

Before the sheriff can turn, Daniel throws himself on the iron bars of his cell and pleads, "Put in a good word for me, Sheriff? At my trial tomorrow? Be a character witness?"

"Problem is, Danny, I've _witnessed_ your character."

"You know I ain't never hurt no one!"

"You stole from the community. You helped two violent rapists to escape. And one of them nearly killed this man's wife." Garland points to Daryl. "So yes, you _have_ hurt someone." The sheriff's walks out.

The jailhouse is almost pitch black, except for the starlight filtering through the open door.

"That true, what he said?" Daniel asks.

"That my wife nearly died 'cause ya let yer brothers go? Yeah."

"You didn't really bury any supplies out there, did you?"

"Nah," Daryl answers, and he doesn't feel the least bit guilty when he does.

"Awww FUCK!" Daniel slams his fist against the iron bars connecting their cage. "Fuck!" He grips the bars and begins shaking them. "Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" The bars rattle in tune with his cries. "I'm gonna die out there now!" Daniel abruptly lets the bars go, plops down on his bench, and buries his hands in his hair.

Daryl picks up his sleeping bag and moves it as far away from their shared cell bars as he can. He spreads it out against the brick wall on the far side of the cell and takes off his boots. Then he crawls into the sleeping bag, with his head under the bench, and rolls on his side with his back to the brick wall.

From the opposite cell, Daniel sighs, but he doesn't scream anymore.

Daryl closes his eyes. He tries to go to sleep, but he can only think of Carol in the infirmary, being calmly interrogated. That uneasy thought, however, is intermittently punctured by a much more pleasant one –

 _She loves me._


	24. Chapter 24

"When Carol first came to, the last thing she could remember was Daryl saying, " _Just love you,_ " her heart feeling like it was about to explode, and then a gunshot. So when she saw the bright, artificial lights of the infirmary, and a short black man in a crisp, clean white lab coat, she thought maybe she'd died and gone to Heaven. Her mind reeled with confusion.

When her eyes fixed on Daryl's familiar face, however, the rest of the memory clicked back into place like a rapidly assembled jigsaw puzzle: scurrying into the woods, watching Daryl leave to investigate, digging through her saddle pack for extra ammo in case something went down, sensing a creeping presence behind her, turning and drawing her handgun and then feeling the sharp blade of a knife puncture her side and rip upward the flesh just before she pulled the trigger.

Now she's trying to assemble the pieces again – this time, the pieces of the puzzle that is Jamestown. She's been working to build a rapport with the doctor ever since the sheriff and Daryl left, and she's done a pretty good job of it. Maybe she's even been flirting with him a little. Doctor or not, a man of his unusually short stature probably doesn't get a lot of attention from the ladies, and he's been soaking it up.

"I really should get going," he says. He's been pretending to tidy his equipment and his counterspace just to stay and keep talking to her. "I need some rest myself."

"Is the guard in the hallway going to get some rest, too?" Carol asks.

"No, he'll be there all night."

She laughs. "What do they think I'm going to do in my state? Every time I try to move, I feel like fainting."

"Well, he's there if you need anything."

"Who insisted on the guard?" Carol asks pleasantly. "The captain or the sheriff?" Daryl seemed unsure as to which was in charge. Perhaps she can learn.

"Probably the sheriff. The captain doesn't handle much in the way of details."

"Because the sheriff's in charge?" she asks casually.

Dr. Ahmad glances at the guard in the hallway and walks over to shut the infirmary door. He comes back and says, "Not officially. Sheriff Garland's influential. Everyone knows he pulls the captain's strings. But the captain doesn't always agree with him."

"How so?" Carol asks.

"For instance, once, the sheriff tried to get rid of the tithe, but the captain put his foot down on that one."

"The tithe?" ask Carol, pulling the blanket up to her neck. It's a little cool in here, though earlier she could have sworn electric heat was floating out of a vent in the ceiling. Perhaps it will again.

"When people go out to scavenge, they're supposed to give one-tenth of everything they find to the captain, three-tenths to the community, and keep six-tenths for themselves. The sheriff thinks it should be half for the community and half for the scavengers and nothing for the captain, unless he's scavenging, too."

"Is that what you call it when you take everything from people you find on the road? Scavenging?" Carol tries to say it lightly, as if she's joking, so she won't offend him, but she thinks it falls flat.

"It's the one-time price of admission," Dr. Ahmad replies defensively. "We've got a lot to offer here. It shouldn't be free. And the people who settle here, in the long run, they end up with twenty-fold whatever we took at the start. Besides, we don't take them back with us unless they _ask_ to be taken back."

"I don't remember asking to be taken back," Carol says while flashing him a friendly smile, "but then, I don't remember much. I'm glad they did, though. Thank you again, so much, for all your skilled help."

The doctor smiles. "Like I said, it's my job."

"This place is all so strangely wonderful," Carol says with widely innocent eyes. "Who do you suppose decided the captain was in charge?"

"He was here from the beginning. A group of men from the U.S. Navy founded this place. There were about thirty of them and fifty survivors, including me, that they took in at the start. A naval committee wrote all the laws and procedures for Jamestown, and it's been kind of a perpetual motion machine ever since. The captain's made a few changes to the charter, like the tithe, but not many." The doctor glances toward the closed door of the infirmary and then back. "He wasn't even a captain at the start. He was just a lieutenant junior grade. But so many of those naval men died fighting back the cannibals and securing Jamestown, that he was promoted quickly through the ranks. And then the admiral, vice admiral, and rear admiral all died of the flu, and suddenly the captain was the head honcho. He has been ever since."

"No one's challenged him for leadership?" Carol asks.

"No one _wants_ to. He was a mighty cannibal slayer, in the beginning. The stories…you'd think he was Samson with his jawbone of an axe slaying a thousand Philistines at once. And then, when we were raided a couple years back, he killed ten of those men single handedly before anyone else was awake. He's…" the doctor glances at the door again, "this goes no farther than this room?"

"My lips are sealed." Carol pretends to yank a zipper across her lips.

"He's stupid. He's stupid, but he's a fighter. And he's not a brutal ruler. He's a bit _greedy_ , but he's not really oppressive. The people we've taken in over the years…many of them have escaped the heels of some pretty horrible rulers. The captain is mild in comparison. And he's a known variable."

"So you've all decided it's best not to rock the ship?"

"Why rock a ship that's been sailing so smoothly for years? It was rough the first year, but in the last six, we've lost only twenty-five people, and added over five hundred."

That _is_ remarkable, Carol thinks, when she considers the number of camps and people that she and Daryl have lost. "Where'd all those people come from?"

"Some people just found us on their own. They would show up at our gates, like the sheriff did. But once the sheriff was here, he formed a posse to go out looking for other survivors like him. Sometimes he would bring in entire small groups."

Like Daryl used to do for the prison, Carol thinks, and Aaron for Alexandria. Only here, there's a finder's fee. "I guess the sheriff stored up a lot of loot that way."

"Not really. Most of the people he found were just eking out an existence. They didn't have many goods, but they had talents. Nearly everyone who was brought in helped build this place up in some way. If - "

The doctor falls abruptly silent. Carol realizes why when the sheriff swings open the door.

"Any reason this door was shut?" Sheriff Garland asks.

"It was getting cool," the doctor says. "I thought I'd trap the heat."

"Well, leave it open at all times, please."

"Yes, sir. I was just heading out for the night." Dr. Ahmad nods to Carol. "I'll be back in the morning to check on you."

"Thank you again, doctor."

When he's gone, Sheriff Garland pulls up a chair beside Carol's bed and sits in it facing her. His eyes are such an unusual shade – almost gray. His mustache and soul patch remind her a bit of Val Kilmer's in _Tombstone,_ but his hair is nothing like – it's thick, wavy, shoulder-length, and dark brown. He's an unusual looking man, but not a bad looking one, in fact, he's rather handsome. Unlike, the doctor, though, she doesn't think he'll be fooled by flattery. In fact, given how he bowled over her routine earlier, she thinks maybe directness is her best approach. "So I take it you're here to interrogate me?"

"I prefer to call it an interview."

Carol laughs. "Is there a job at the end of this tunnel?"

"I'm not quite sure _what's_ at the end of this tunnel. I'm still exploring it. Why did you lie about being married?"

"Excuse me?"

"Or why did Daryl lie about being married? Because I suppose you haven't. Except to use his last name. That is _his_ last name, isn't it? Dixon?"

"Yes."

"But it's not _yours_?"

Carol briefly considers lying, but she doesn't think that will work. So instead she answers his question with a question: "Why do you think we aren't married?"

"All the jewelry stores in the world, and he couldn't be bothered to get you a wedding ring?"

Carol's eyes flit to the sheriff's ring finger, and she sees the platinum band. Again, she returns a question with a question: "Do you think it's practical, in this world, to wear a wedding band, given all the things it might get caught up on?"

"Since when has a woman ever cared about practicality when it comes to weddings?"

She smiles slightly.

"And you wore a wedding band once," he says. "Not all that long ago. There's still the hint of a tan line."

Instinctively, two of Carol's fingers from her right hand go to the ring finger on her left hand and toy with the empty spot. It was four months before she took her wedding and engagement rings off. It was seven months before Daryl commented on their absence. "Yes," she says. "My second husband died a year ago. My first died toward the start."

"My wife tells me that the third time's a charm."

"Is it your third time?" she asks.

"No. Hers. It's my first."

"No offense, but you seem a bit old for it to be a first." He looks like he's in his early forties.

"I never made it out of the gate. I had two broken engagements by the time I was thirty-four. I suppose my job as a homicide detective didn't lend itself to settled life. After that, I gave up on the idea, until the world ended and a few years later I met Shannon. And then I thought – maybe this woman will actually stay. After all, where has she got to go?"

"So far so good?" Carol asks.

"Yes, but it's only been a little under two years."

"Well," Carol says, "that's a lifetime in the apocalypse. You've made it past the seven-month itch."

He smiles, but then he controls that smile and forces it away. "Why did you lie? About being married?"

"It just seemed the easiest way to explain our relationship. We're more than friends. And there's something safer about it, among strangers, I think, saying – this is my husband."

"Because a husband's more likely to kill to protect you than a boyfriend is?" Sheriff Garland asks.

"Well, it's a risky world."

"Daryl says you came to Jamestown in search of your roots?"

"I did," she replies. "But I can see why you might be skeptical."

"It's more that I'm confused. The evidence points in one direction, but _logic_ points in another. _Logic_ says no one leaves a secure camp to wander hundreds of miles through a field of cannibals just to draw a family tree. I gather Daryl followed you because he's head over heels in love with you, but why did _you_ want to do it?"

"Maybe for the same reason," Carol says, admitting to herself, for the first time, the depth of her own motivations.

"I'm not following."

"Maybe it was an excuse to get Daryl to spend a lot of time alone with me."

"Why in God's name would you need an excuse?" Sheriff Garland asks.

"Because Daryl is…Daryl. He couldn't just come straight out and say he we wanted to be more than friends."

"Then why couldn't _you_ just come straight out and say it, if that's what you wanted?"

"I did. More or less. Eventually. But I had to lay the groundwork first with the road trip. I had to get him comfortable. Because otherwise it might have frightened him."

The sheriff laughs. "That man doesn't seem like he frightens easy."

"Well, not when it comes to the things that frighten most people."

Garland studies her with his head tilted to one side. "So you wooed him? _You_ …the _woman_? _You_ wooed the _man_?"

"Well, he wooed me, too. He's wooed me since the farm. He just didn't know he was doing it."

"Since the farm?" he asks.

"It was one of our first camps. We've been through several."

"And now you're together in the headquarters of your alliance? Or is Daryl heading one of the other several camps?"

It's a casual and seamless transition, and it almost trips Carol up. _Almost._ "There are two camps in our alliance," she replies, "since that's what you want to know. There's ours, near D.C., which has about five hundred people, and another one near Baltimore, which only has about ninety."

None of that is true, of course. The Kingdom has less than two hundred people, and there is no camp near Baltimore. But she figures if Jamestown is more sinister than it appears, if it _does_ decide to raid one of their camps, it will probably be that imaginary, smaller one. She chose the number five hundred for the Kingdom because she knows Jamestown has six hundred. She figures that way, they'll feel the Kingdom is a good match and not worth the risk of raiding, but also not so huge that the Kingdom would likely risk raiding Jamestown either. _Mutually assured destruction_ is what they used to call it back in the 1980s, when she was in high school, and the Cold War was raging.

The sheriff must buy it, because he changes the subject. "The ancestor you presumably came to Jamestown to discover, what's his name?"

"Thomas Alan Mercer. My mother said- "

"- Knock. Knock."

Carol looks away from the sheriff to see a beautiful, smiling, green-eyed, thirty-something redhead in the doorway. She's holding folded clothes. "Carol," she says, and Carol wonders how she knows her name, "I brought you your sweatpants and that Monticello sweatshirt out of your pack and some fresh clean underwear. I'll help you get changed if you can't manage."

At this, Sheriff Garland rises. "You're supposed to be resting in bed. Did you _walk_ all the way here?"

"I _did_ rest, baby, and I feel _fine_. Carol shouldn't have to sleep in her underwear, now should she? It's probably got some blood on it."

"You could have sent _me_ back with the clothes," the sheriff tells her.

"Well I didn't know where you'd gone and wandered off to. And I don't think she wants a _man_ helping to dress her."

"I'd have had the doctor do it."

"Well he's a man, too, Garland."

"He's a doctor."

Carol puts two and two together and figures this woman is Shannon, the sheriff's wife and her blood donor.

Shannon puts a hand on Garland's wrist and says, "My mama's fit to be tied. Gary _will_ not settle down in his bed. He's run out of it three times now. I think he's going to need stern daddy tonight."

"I'll see what I can do." Garland bends down and kisses her.

When he disappears, Shannon shuts the door behind him and draws the blinds for privacy, saying, " _Men_. They have no idea how much a nice fresh pair of clothes can improve a girl's mood. Let's get you dressed."


	25. Chapter 25

Carol says she doesn't need the help dressing, but she soon finds she does. Her head is feeling light from the effort when she slides back under the covers in her soft clothes. "Why are these so warm?" she asks.

"They just came out of the dryer," Shannon replies. "One of the laundry ladies did them. Washing the clothes before inventorying them is part of the procedure."

"You have a dryer?" Carol asks in surprise.

"Two actually. Industrial ones. And two washers. They were for the museum to wash costumes for the employees. This used to be a living history sort of place."

Carol adjusts herself so she's sitting up in bed. "So you have running water and power?"

"Only in the museum. They renovated it a year before the Great Sickness, as part of that whole green energy craze. Good thing for us. The power comes from solar panels. The water comes from underground wells. There's even two shower stalls each in the men's and women's employee locker rooms. But Garand and I don't get to live in here."

"Who does?" Carol asks innocently.

"The orphans. The doctor and his wife." Dr. Ahmad has a wife? Carol never would have guessed from the way he responded to her attention. "The nannies – these two elderly women whose job it is to check in on the kids. The captain. And four naval families who were here at the start. But we _all_ get a hot shower once a week. There's a schedule and a time limit, or we'd run out of water. The rest of the time we bathe in the river or use the washing troughs with hot water from a kettle."

"Do you have working toilets?" Because as soon as Carol can walk, she would much prefer that to the bed pan the doctor left her.

"In the bathrooms in the museum, yes. All on a septic system. But most of us just use the outhouses that are closer to the Settlement or Indian Village where the bulk of us live."

When Shannon falls silent, Carol tries to think of an in. She wants to establish a rapport with this woman the way she did with the doctor. As the sheriff's wife, Shannon's bound to know a lot, and she also probably has influence over him. "You have a little boy?" Carol asks, remembering Shannon's conversation with Garland as he left.

"He'll be two in two months. Garland, Junior. But we call him Gary."

"Does he look like his father?"

"Yes, very much as a matter of fact, but Garland's not his daddy, _biologically_ speaking. My camp raided this place a couple years ago. I was pregnant, so I stayed behind. Not that I would have joined anyway. I begged my husband not to. I _told_ him not to listen to Mark. But he stopped hearing anything I said years ago."

" _Your_ people raided this camp?" Carol asks in genuine surprise.

Shannon nods and sits down in the chair Garland vacated, which is a good sign. It means she's going to stay and talk awhile. Maybe Carol will learn something.

"We were running out food at that point," Shannon explains. "Our gardens weren't growing, and there was less and less to scavenge. We had two hunters, but winter was coming, when game is scarce, and we had about two months before we knew we were going to be starving. One of ours, Mark, found this place one day, when he was out scavenging, and they brought him in. He didn't say a word about our camp because he wasn't sure what he was getting into. Jamestown told him he could stay permanently after a trial period. Well, he asked to leave after just a month, said he didn't want to join."

 _That's_ why they're suspicious of people who want to leave now.

"But by then he'd gotten the lay of the land," Shannon continues, "found out as much as he could, seduced some whore – pardon my French - and got himself an inside helper out of her. Mark told us his woman would let us in, and we could take the place by surprise at night."

"And everyone agreed to do it?" There's more curiosity than judgment in Carol's voice. She can't help but think of Alexandria's decision to slaughter those Saviors in their sleep because they needed the Hilltop's food. It's not the same, but it's not as different as she'd like it to be, either.

"I tried to talk them out of it. I thought there had to be a better way to survive. I said well, maybe we can just show up at their gates, hands up, and ask to join them, work for them in exchange for food. I said they took Mark in, maybe they'll take us all in. But Mark said the inhabitants of Jamestown were brutal people, and they made all the women sex slaves. He made up all sorts of lies about them. He made it seem like they were _worth_ killing. But when it was all said and done, they took in the twenty of us who were left behind. Kids, mostly. Daryl says y'all did that, too? Took in some of the people in a camp you defeated?"

Carol opens her mouth and then closes it. Daryl warned her to be careful around this woman, and she can see why now. She doesn't answer Shannon's question, but instead changes the subject. "It must have been scary at first, when they found you and you realized your people had been defeated."

"It was Garland and his posse who found us. Only eight men, but I guess they'd spied our camp out from a distance enough to know we only had four women and a gaggle of kids. And there was only one shotgun between us. They rolled right on in. I thought it was the end for sure, that, after the lies Mark told, there was nothing but months of brutal gang rape in my future until I died. So I figured I'd go out in a blaze of gun smoke. I pumped that one shotgun, and before I could fire it, Garland thundered right by on his horse and plucked it straight out of my hands. Now _that's_ a story to tell your kids one day when they ask you how you met. How did you and Daryl meet?"

She's fishing for information again, Carol sees, but it doesn't hurt to answer this one. That was in another, long-gone world. "At the start. I was in this camp in a quarry outside of Atlanta –"

"Georgia? You really came a long way to settle in D.C. You did settle in D.C., right?"

She already knows they did. Maybe Shannon's hoping Carol will get more specific. "More or less," Carol replies. "Anyway, there weren't many walkers – you call them cannibals – up there, not at first. They started coming up later when they ran out of food in the cities. So I was going off into the woods to use the restroom privately. I was starting to undo my pants where there was this voice behind me – _I wouldn't piss there. Don't you see that diamondback?_ I screamed because there was a strange man behind me, and then this snake – which looked just like the forest floor - rattled right by my foot, and then there was this _thunk,_ and an arrow went flying right into it."

"The crossbow was his weapon of choice even back then?" Shannon asks.

Shannon's been rummaging through their supplies, Carol sees, maybe with the sheriff, as part of the investigation. "Yes. I do hope he gets that back. It's his baby."

"Well that's a fine damsel in distress story," Shannon says, ignoring the question of if they will get their weapons back. "Did you fall in love with him right then and there?"

"No. Not by a long shot."

"Then when?"

"I can't say," Carol answers. "I've probably fallen in six different kinds of love with him over the years."

"I couldn't say when I fell in love with Garland either. It came on gradually, after we were married."

Carol's no longer sure who's trying to build a rapport with whom here. "After?"

"The captain was understandably reluctant to take us in, given what our people did. They corralled us under guard the first week, and the captain and Garland asked us a lot of questions. During one of those 'interviews,' I asked the captain what would reassure him that we meant to be a productive part of the community and cause it no harm, and he said if we were family of anyone at Jamestown, that would be one thing, but we weren't. We didn't have anyone to vouch for us or keep an eye on us. Anyway, later that evening, Garland shows up in the orphanage where we were all being kept and tells the guard he's taking me for a walk. And that's when he proposed. He said, give that baby in your womb my name, and I'll take care of it and you and your mother." Shannon laughs. "You know how those old alliances were formed through marriage? I guess we've been thrown back to that ancient world in more ways than one."

"So you had a forced marriage?" Carol asks.

"I wouldn't call it _forced_. _Arranged_ , more like. I could have said no and taken my chances. Garland would have kept trying to convince the captain. But he thought this would be easier, and so did I. Besides, I was going to be out of commission for a while with the last month or two of pregnancy and the baby, and I wouldn't be able to work. I needed a husband who would earn my share of the rations. That's how we do it here - if someone can't work, someone else has to volunteer to step up and take on extra work on their behalf. I needed someone to lean on, and I think maybe Garland needed someone to lean. He'd always wanted a family, and it had just never worked out for him. And here a family was, ready to order, baby already in the womb, mother-in-law in tow. Who knew when another available woman would ever set foot in Jamestown. And, let's be honest, he was probably looking forward to having some sex for a change, too. He never was one to go to the whorehut."

Carol raises an eyebrow. "So there really is a brothel here?"

"I'm not a fan of it, but at least it's purely voluntary. The men here are mostly well behaved, though we had a terrible incident a month ago. We just convicted two men of rape. They were sentenced to hang, but they escaped, and one of them was the man who stabbed you."

Carol feigns surprise. She doesn't want Shannon to know she already knew that because she'd been talking in hushed whispers to Daryl while the doctor was gone. "Well, I feel better knowing I killed someone who was already condemned."

"Well, he was also trying to _kill you_ ," Shannon says.

"There is that," Carol agrees. "So it worked out? Your marriage?"

"I agreed because Garland seemed like a respectable and honest man to me, so I thought ours would be a tolerable marriage of convenience. It's turned out to be much more than that." Shannon smiles. "I don't think he expected me to talk so much, though. I was much quieter when I first got here. It wasn't just that I was scared of a new place. The brutal world out there beat me down. Once I was secure again, though, I guess my old personality came back."

"I know what that's like," Carol says. At the prison and in the Kingdom, during those stretches when things were settled, when she wasn't forced to kill other human beings to survive, she could be more herself. Some of the best parts of her old personality – the good humor, the affection, the maternal nature – came back without the old timidness, fear, and excessive deference also returning. In a way, she became like she was _before_ Ed, but stronger.

They talk a little longer, and Shannon makes a few more innocent fishing attempts for information about their camps, but Carol doesn't give her anything she doesn't already know. They're interrupted when the door swings suddenly open. A massive man stands in the doorway, his belt buckle undone, and his shirt half tucked into his pants and half untucked. He sways slightly to and fro.

Shannon leans forward and whispers to Carol. "Looks like he hit the bad moonshine after he spent all that good whiskey in the whorehut." Pulling back Shannon says. "Hello, Captain."

The captain leans on the door frame, raises one black, bushy eyebrow, and points toward Carol. "It's time for me to interrogate the captive and get to the bottom of this caper!" His voice rises on the word _caper_ , like a theatrical actor's. "Who? What? When? Where?" he barks toward Carol.

Shannon bites down on a smile. "I think it's time for you to get to bed, John."

"Are _you_ taking me to bed, gorgeous?" the Captain wiggles his eyebrow up and down. "I don't think Gar would mind. He's a generous man. A very generous man."

"Not _that_ generous."

"I should have volunteered to marry you instead of him," the captain says, slurring slightly. "Who knew after you dropped that baby you'd have such a lovely figure?"

"You damn me with faint praise, Captain." Shannon stands from her chair.

"I'd have made you a fantastic husband!" he booms. "I mean, maybe a _little_ cheating." The captain holds his thumb and forefinger an inch a part. "Just a _little_. Solo un poco. You like that? I hear women love a man who speaks French."

"That's Spanish, Captain."

He starts laughing and has to slam his palm against the doorframe to hold himself up.

"Come on, Captain," Shannon tells him, and puts a hand on his shoulder to gently push him back from the doorway. He stumbles back a few steps, nearly falls, and the guard catches him – almost getting knocked over himself in the process by the bulk of the man.

"Get him to bed, will you?" Shannon asks crisply. It's the first time Carol's heard a hard edge to her voice, and it gives her a hint of how formidable this woman could be, perhaps, if she needed to be.

"Yes, ma'am," the guard replies.

Shannon turns around, her voice returning to sweetness. "Sorry about that display. The guard will get him settled, and I'm sure he'll pass out and leave you alone tonight. Once Garland talks to him, he probably won't bother to question you at all, or at least he won't without Garland present. I'll bring you some books in the morning. It's got to be boring in here. But tonight you should get some sleep. This door will be open. If you need anything, you just holler at the guard. He'll be in the hall all night."

Shannon flicks the overhead lights off on her way out. The infirmary is bathed in shadows, and in the hallway glows a single overhead light. Through the open doorway, Carol watches the guard return. He shakes his head, slumps into his blue plastic chair, and lays his rifle across his lap.


	26. Chapter 26

When someone enters the jailhouse early the next morning, Daryl clatters anxiously to his feet, but it's only the bailiff Earl, come to get Daniel for his trial.

Daryl throws himself back down on his bench and waits, jumping at every shadow in the doorway for the next two hours. The sheriff finally appears, saying, "Sorry it's a bit late in the morning, but I had to testify at the trial."

Garland takes him out of the cell but doesn't cuff him. He does guide him by the arm, however. When they emerge into the settlement, one group of kids is filing out of the one-room schoolhouse for recess while another group is marching in for lessons. Garland stops by an outhouse so Daryl can use something better than a piss pot, and then by a washing trough so he can, the sheriff says, "look presentable for your woman."

Carol is awake and looking about two times better when they get to the infirmary. Garland lets Daryl wheel her to the breakroom in a wheelchair for breakfast, where Shannon has just finished placing a meal on the table. "You two love birds enjoy," Shannon says.

Carol thanks her for the meal and again for her life-saving blood. Shannon and Garland both leave them alone, the sheriff warning, "There's a guard outside this door." He shuts the door on his way out.

Carol looks at the repast before her – a heaping bowl of oatmeal topped with fresh, sliced strawberries, a glass of water, and a hot cup of coffee. "They must grow oats here," she says. "This doesn't look like it came from a box."

Meanwhile, Daryl continues to stand and look around the room. He checks the position of the guard and determines he's too far away to hear a quiet conversation across the table through a closed door. He also checks the breakroom for vents and windows to make sure the sheriff isn't outside somewhere listening in. There are no windows, and only one vent, on the wall at the end of the counter, which Daryl closes and then shoves the microwave against.

Finally, he sits down in the folding chair across from Carol. She takes her first bite of oatmeal after blowing off a curl of steam from her spoon.

He picks up his spoon and asks, "Sheriff interrogate you last night?"

"He asked me how many communities there were, since you kind of let the cat out of the bag that it wasn't just the Kingdom."

"Sorry," Daryl mutters, and shamefully shovels a spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth.

"The captain stopped by, too, later."

Daryl looks up abruptly from his bowl. If that man so much as laid a finger on her… "He touch you?"

"Shannon didn't even let him through the door. He was _very_ drunk."

"Shannon?" Daryl asks. "Thought Garland took 'er home."

"She came back to bring me some clothes. We chatted last night. I think I like her, but she's a crafty one. Don't feel so bad about tripping up, Pookie. She almost tripped me up, too."

"Ya tell 'er anything?" Daryl asks.

"I didn't tell her or Sheriff Garland anything they didn't already know or that mattered if they did know. They don't _seem_ like the type to raid camps here, and I _think_ they'll leave us alone, but better safe than sorry. The less they know about the other communities, the better. So I told Sheriff Garland there were only two camps…" She goes onto to explain what she said and why she said it.

Daryl smiles. "I married a smart one."

Carol chuckles. "He doesn't believe we're married because you haven't put a ring on it. So I admitted we're not." Daryl's annoyed the sheriff saw through yet another lie, but his annoyance must look like disappointment, because Carol asks, "Why? Did you _want_ to be married?"

"Nah!" That came out more forcefully than he meant it to, and he can see the hurt look on her face. He just means it wasn't what he was thinking at the moment. "Nah, don't mean no. _Not_ no. Not _yes_ neither. Just…dunno," he stumbles. "Wouldn't mind if we was. Just wouldn't know how to do it."

"How to do what?"

"Be married."

Carol smiles. "You wouldn't have to _do_ anything other than what you _do_ already. You'd just have to promise never to leave me and never to make out with anyone else."

"Ain't never gonna do that anyway." Daryl shovels his oatmeal into his mouth and wonders what just happened in this conversation. Did they just get engaged? Are they _more_ than more-than-friends now? He eats until his spoon scrapes the bottom of the bowl.

Carol eats quietly and seems to be thinking, about what, Daryl doesn't know. Maybe she's thinking about their engagement. _If_ they _are_ engaged. Are they?

It'll be easier if he doesn't have to think about it. She'll probably tell him eventually if they are. Daryl slides his coffee cup toward himself and looks at her. "Sherriff seem to believe ya?"

"He seemed to buy it completely. He moved on to another topic."

Carol's a much better liar, Daryl thinks. She had a lot of practice, married to Ed – not just lying about the bruises, but lying to him to stroke his ego. Daryl's a horrible liar. That's why he _usually_ opts to keep his mouth shut. "What else he ask ya?"

"Who my Jamestown ancestor was."

"'N what else?"

"That was it."

"Really?" Daryl asks skeptically.

"We chatted a little, but those were the only real questions he asked."

"So ya think the sheriff's really in charge?"

"I think it's twenty percent the captain and eighty percent the sheriff." Carol pushes her bowl aside. "But you know who's in charge of the sheriff?"

No. Daryl doesn't. Did Carol find out about another top leader? "Who?"

"His wife. Shannon."

Daryl snorts, but then peers at Carol because he's not sure she isn't serious.

"She has a lot of influence over him, anyway. I'm trying to get more out of her, to build a connection. Girl to girl."

"Cookie Carol's makin' an appearance?" Daryl asks with a smirk. "Need a cardigan?"

Carol rolls her eyes. They talk a little more as they drain the last of their coffee, about how they're being treated, and where they might want to stop on the way home if they ever do get out of here and finish their road trip.

Carol falls silent because there's a knock on the door. "Y'all done eating?" the sheriff asks after he swings it open.

"Yes, thank you," Carol tells him.

Garland strolls in. "The doctor's in the infirmary," he tells Carol. "He's coming to get you in just a second. He needs to check out your vitals and all that. Shannon left you some books for the afternoon. I'm going to need to take Daryl back to his cell." He motions for Daryl to stand up and turn around.

Daryl sighs and complies.

"Is keeping him in a _cell_ really necessary?" Carol asks.

"It's protocol," Garland replies. "Until we can get everything straightened out."

Daryl, with his hands behind his back, bends down to kiss Carol. She reaches up and puts a hand behind his head to push him in deeper. She smells of bitter-sweet strawberries and he wants to taste her forever.

After a while, Garland clears his throat.

 **[*]**

Birds swoop and caw over the James River as Garland leads Daryl down the docks back toward the settlement and the jailhouse. The _Godspeed_ is just starting to head down the river. The captain stands at the helm, back straight, chin up, hands on the wheel, and a white cap on his head as fishermen untangle their nets on the decks and sailors tug on ropes to finish hoisting a sail.

"Surprised the captain ain't hungover," Daryl says. "Carol said he was real drunk last night."

"He's never hungover," Garland replies. "It's one of his rare talents."

"Sounds more like a curse." Bad hangovers were probably the one thing that kept Daryl from becoming a drunk like his parents. Well…that and not _wanting_ to be a drunk like his parents.

When they've just about reached the wooden, triangular fence around the settlement, three horses ride out of it toward them. Daniel sits on one with his hands cuffed to the horn of the saddle. Behind him, holding the reins, sits Earl, Garland's balliff. A rifle dangles from his left shoulder. Two more armed, mounted men flank them.

"The verdict's in already?" the sheriff asks Earl.

Earl nods. "Banishment. We're taking him and dropping him somewhere several miles outside of Jamestown and leaving him with a tent, enough food and water for three days, a hunting knife, and a mini-axe. We'll be back by tomorrow afternoon."

"Might as well just have executed me," Daniel says. "Would have saved y'all a lot of time and trouble."

Sheriff Garland says nothing and pushes Daryl onward.

[*]

Daryl's alone in his cell in the empty jailhouse for quite some time. The sheriff has left him a stack of his own books – a Louis L'Amour western, a Raymond Chandler hardboiled detective novel, William Faulkner's _As I Lay Dying_ , Cormac McCarthy's _All the Pretty Horses_ , and a 1999 _Gun Digest_.

Daryl flips through the _Gun Digest_ for fifteen minutes and then tosses it aside. He picks up the Cormac McCarthy book but puts it down after ten pages. This damn writer doesn't use quotation marks or hardly any commas, and Daryl can't tell who's saying what half the time. Besides, it's boring. The Faulkner novel is even worse. It makes his brain hurt. Daryl wonders what it says about the sheriff that he reads this kind of crap.

The Louis L'Amour book turns out to be much better. In fact, Daryl blows through it in about an hour and a half. It's good, except for the completely unnecessary romantic subplot. By then he's tired of reading. So he does 150 sit-ups and 45 push-ups. He unlaces and re-laces his boots more neatly. He plays tic-tac-toe with himself in the dirt and loses.

For the next half hour, Daryl paces the cell and thinks about Carol, about whether or not she thinks they're engaged or wants them to be. He worries about whether or not he's supposed to propose. He thinks about what kind of husband Ezekiel was, and about what kind of husband Carol might expect him to be. He recalls his parents' own terrible marriage, their constant fighting, his father's cheating, and his mother's drive to drown her sorrows in the bottle. He thinks about what it might be like, to wake up beside Carol every morning and have sex before breakfast, or at least a chance to _try_ for sex before breakfast. He thinks about what it would be like to have sex with her at all, since they haven't actually made it that far yet. He worries if she's going to like it if and when they finally do, if he's going to hold out long enough to get her off, if he's ever going to get out of this place and have a _chance_ to get her off.

Sherriff Garland returns. A wooden chair scrapes across the floor of the jailhouse, leaving light brown tracks of upturned dirt, as the sheriff pulls it before the iron bars. He sits down and tells Daryl to have a seat, too. Daryl does, on his little cell bench.

Garland reaches into the inside pocket of his brown suede vest – which he must love as much as Daryl loves his black leather vest with wings, because Daryl's never seen him in any other jacket - and pulls out a small, handheld, battery-operated tape recorder.

 _What the hell?_

Garland holds up the tape recorder where Daryl can see it through the bars, and then he clicks play.

Carol's familiar voice seeps through the tiny speaker, speaking words from their conversation in the breakroom: "The less they know about the other communities, the better…"


	27. Chapter 27

In Daryl's gut there rests what feels like a huge, tangled, rolled-up ball of heavy copper wire.

 _Shit._

 _Fuck._

"….so I lied and told him there's only one other camp in Baltimore..." Carol's voice dies as Garland clicks the tape recorder off.

The sheriff coolly opens his vest and drops the tiny recorder into his inside pocket. "My wife kindly secured that recorder under your table when she was setting it for breakfast. You thought to check for vents, I see, even moved the microwave to better block one after closing it, but you didn't think to check for recording devices. Who does in a world like this?"

Daryl grits down on his back teeth and waits.

Garland pats his vest over the spot where the recorder rests inside. "I was out of batteries for that little tool, but, fortunately, you yourself scavenged some. They still worked, believe it or not." He crosses his leg and sets one hand on the foot of his black-and-white calfskin cowboy boot. "Clearly you come from an alliance of some sort, with at least one camp in Washington, D.C., and _at least_ two more camps, _neither_ of which is in Baltimore. How big is this alliance, really?"

Daryl keeps his mouth shut this time.

"No, you're not going to tell me that, of course. But you and your woman both, you've been lying through your teeth ever since you got here, changing your story, flipping it this way and that."

Daryl swallows, stares straight ahead at the sheriff, and says nothing.

"Which is why I planted the tape recorder. I knew you wouldn't be honest with me, but I figured you'd be honest with each other. I've spent the last couple of hours doing some sleuthing in the museum's archives. Carol said her ancestor was named Thomas Alan Mercer. I found his name in a ledger of recorded deaths. He came to Jamestown in a late wave of settlers, after the Starving Time, luckily for him. That was a grim time. Did you know the earliest English settlers resorted to cannibalism?"

Daryl shakes his head slightly.

"That's the supposition, anyway. Archeologists exhumed the bones of a fourteen-year-old girl that was buried here in the 1600s. They discovered there were tentative chops made to her forehead. Then the girl was turned over, and there were four strikes made to the back of her head. The strongest one split her skull clear in half. A penetrating wound was then made here." The sheriff points to his left temple. "Likely by a single-sided knife. That was then used to pry the skull open and remove the brain."

Daryl's fingers wrap tightly around the rough, wooden edges of his bench. Half-buried, nightmare memories of Terminus flash through his mind.

"She was _murdered_ ," the sheriff says. "A fourteen-year-old girl. For _food_. It's amazing, isn't it, the lengths that people will go to survive in times of hardship? The lies they will tell. The people they will betray. The children they will murder. The unnatural crimes they will commit."

Daryl shifts uneasily on his bench. He has no idea where the sheriff is going with this.

"That's why we have to protect ourselves. That's why we have to have…" - He waves around the jailhouse - "…procedures in place. Rules. Interviews. Investigations. Trials. And even those sometimes fail. Even then someone can convince you that they're alone in this world and mean you no harm. And then when you let them go, they can come back a week later with an army who will murder you in your sleep."

Daryl swallows, but still does not speak.

"Thomas Alan Mercer was not eaten," Sheriff Garland says. "He died at the ripe old age of eighty-eight. So I suppose the Mercer line persisted. And I did find that grave rubbing among Carol's things – for a Father George Aaron Mercer. You weren't lying when you said she was tracing her roots. You lied about _other_ things, but you lied to protect your communities. You lied because you're afraid Jamestown might roll in and raid one of those camps. You don't trust us anymore than we trust you. That's just the way of things, isn't it?"

Daryl doesn't reply.

"As far flung as your little road trip in search of roots story may appear on first glance, I _do_ believe you. I don't think you came to do us harm. And based on the conversation you two had in the breakroom, I don't think you'll seek to do us harm if we let you go. I think you're just afraid we'll do harm to _you_. That conversation made it clear to me what you were lying about and why."

The great ball of tension in Daryl's gut unwinds, and hope begins to buoy up in him. "That mean we're goin' home?"

"That's not up to me. That will require a trial for release. It will be up to the jury to decide that."

"Thought the captain made those decisions," Daryl says.

"The captain has veto power. He can overturn any jury verdict and demand a re-trial with a new jury."

This _jury_ sounds almost like a council, and the captain like a mayor. Maybe things aren't run in as authoritarian a manner here as Daryl first assumed.

"I'll present my evidence," the sheriff continues, "and I'll recommend you be allowed to leave. But the jury can come to a different conclusion. And the captain can overturn any conclusion they come to."

"That spy? One came back 'n raided this place? Did ya recommend he be allowed to leave?" If the sheriff _did_ , his testimony on their behalf may not mean much.

The sheriff nods. "It was my greatest mistake. He deceived me, and I blame myself for the deaths that followed. There are others who blame me, too."

"Ya seem to be pretty well liked 'round here."

"Not by anyone who lost family that day."

"But it ain't all on ya," Daryl says. "Jury let 'em go, right?"

"Because the jury respected my opinion," the sheriff replies. "And the captain didn't veto it because he respected my opinion. But I can't guarantee he won't veto a release decision now. We've admitted people successfully to the community since that raid, but no one has asked to _leave_ since then."

"How's the jury chosen?"

"By lottery. Six names are drawn at random from a pool of all citizens, which means everyone age seventeen and up who has received full admission to the community." He glances toward the jailhouse door, uncrosses his leg, and plants his boot back on the dirt floor. Leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, the sheriff says, "Look, if the jury decides it doesn't trust my judgment, the worst thing that's going to happen is that they decide to keep you under lock and key another week or two while further investigation is conducted and another trial is arranged for probationary admission. After all, we don't execute anyone unless and until they commit a heinous crime. So if you aren't released, eventually you'll be granted probationary admission. During those four probation months, if you keep your nose clean and you work hard and you don't cause trouble, you can get your weapons and horses back. One day, when you're on the outside working – maybe as a scavenger, hunting, gathering, whatever it is you can do - you can just slip away. My posse and I won't chase you." The sheriff sits back. "Well, we _will_ , for a while. But we won't catch you. I'll see to that."

"Won't that damage yer reputation 'n influence? If ya lose us?"

"Most likely."

"Why would ya do that for us then?"

"Because I think you mean us no harm. I think you have homes and people to go back to. And I've read Aesop's fable about the lion and the mouse."

"I ain't."

"Well, it's a good one."

"When's this trial for release?" Daryl asks.

"I'm going to apply to put it on the docket when I leave here. It will probably be scheduled for the day after tomorrow, to allow time for the baliff to return from dropping Daniel in the woods and for jury selection. Until then, I'm sorry, but I have to keep you and Carol apart. It's pre-trial protocol. She'll stay in the infirmary under guard, and you'll stay here. I can't let you see each other until the trial is over. If I did, it might appear to the jury you had opportunity to colluded on your stories."

Daryl throws his head back against the brick wall of the cell and sighs. "A'ight. Understand."

[*]

It's Shannon who delivers the news to Carol in the infirmary, after pulling up a chair beside her bed. She launches into the situation directly, without all the drama of playing the tape or telling stories of early colonial cannibals.

Carol shakes her head. "I didn't even _consider_ the possibility you might be recording us."

"Garland was gambling you wouldn't."

"We even used a working boombox at a bar a couple nights ago!" Carol's irritated with herself. "And still _I_ didn't think of it."

"Well, think of it this way. If you _had_ suspected, and you'd just kept lying, Garland never would have been confident he knew the truth, and he wouldn't be able to argue for release."

"I suppose."

"Why do you call it the Kingdom?" Shannon asks. "Your camp?"

Carol thinks that, at this point, Shannon's just curious rather than fishing for information. Even so, out of instinctive caution, she doesn't say anyhting that matters. "The man who founded it…" Carol smiles, "let's just say he had a theatrical bent. He was a zookeeper by profession, but he used to do community theater as a hobby. He acted in Shakespeare plays. And when he built the camp, he called it the Kingdom, and he called himself King Ezekiel."

"Sounds like one hell of a pompous ass."

"He was my husband."

"Oh." Shannon looks genuinely embarrassed. "Sorry."

"He was….corny," Carol admits. "But he was a good, kind man."

"I thought you said you'd been in love with Daryl all these years?"

"I have. In one way or the other. But…we drifted apart. We were in different communities. I experienced some…horrors." She won't say what she did to survive or to protect her people, for fear of coming across as a threat again. "I needed to move on from them, to forget them, to rebuild. So I did. But Ezekiel died last year."

"So then…you're the _Queen_?" Shannon asks.

"I don't typically call myself that. But…yes."

"So you _really_ need to get home then. Your people are counting on you."

Carol nods. "I understand if we're released, we'll get our horses and weapons back?"

"Yes, and you'll get your riding gear, bedrolls, canteens, personal effects, and a tenth of your ammo. But everything else has already been confiscated and divvied up. If it helps you to be less resentful, consider it your payment for your medical care and your room and board while you're here. And for stabling and feeding your horses."

"Well," Carol says, glancing around the infirmary. "It _is_ high quality medical care. And I _am_ alive. But do you think the jury _will_ release us?"

"Garland will make a good argument," is all Shannon will say.

"And the prosecutor?" Carol asks. "Is he good?" She's thinking of Garland as their defender, so she assumes someone will be arguing against letting them leave.

"There's no prosecutor. It's not that kind of trial. The captain will direct the proceedings." Carol doesn't like the sound of that. "The jury can ask questions of Garland and of you and Daryl when you testify will represnet your application for release"

"Do we have to testify?" Carol asks.

"You're applying for release. If you don't testify, there's no application. You don't have to say anything other than that you wish to be released, and why, and then you have to answer any questions thrown your way."

Carol sighs. She wishes she could make preparations with Daryl. "I guess that's why you keep groups apart until the trial."

"I am sorry about that, but it's protocol. The only reason Garland let you two see each other at all was as part of his investigation. But if he violates pre-trial protocol, it might damage your case. When you _do_ testify, just stick to the truth while saying as little as possible. Garland will advise Daryl to do the same." Shannon stands up. "I have to go. I need to get to work."

"What do you do?" Carol asks.

"I'm in charge of the eastern gardens. Three of them. I supervise, but I also get my hands dirty." Shannon turns them palm forward and wiggles her fingers, and Carol can see they're stained black with soil. "I just took a break to come and tell you the news."

When Shannon leaves, Carol returns to the stack of books she's left her, but she gets bored reading and eventually shouts hello to the guard in the hallway.

He pops his head in. He's a young man, maybe in his early twenties, and he reminds her a bit of Henry, who is too grown up for his own good now. Henry's only sixteen, but he's already left home for Oceanside. Carol's looking forward to seeing him at the late May fair, though, that is, _if_ she and Daryl are back in time for it, _if_ they win this trial.

"Yes, ma'am. Do you need something?" the guard asks.

"I was just saying hello. There's not much going on in here. What's your name?"

"I'm, sorry, ma'am, but I'm not permitted to fraternize with uncleared foreigners." He returns to his chair, sits down with his gun across his lap, and looks away from her, down the hall to his left.

Carol sighs and picks up a book. It's going to be a long next three or four days before this trial is over and a verdict is reached.


	28. Chapter 28

The sheriff comes to the jailhouse the next morning with a plate of food – scrambled eggs, pan fried potatoes, and strawberries. Jamestown must have had a bumper early spring strawberry crop. He tells Daryl that the trial's been slated to start tomorrow afternoon.

Then he takes Daryl to the outhouse and to scrub up. Afterwards, he cuffs his hands in front and walks with him around the inside perimeter of the settlement, along the fence line, so he can get some fresh air and exercise. Lots of people give Daryl curious glances, but no one tries to talk to him. Three men walk by with broken, open shotguns in the crooks of their arms and two barking dogs on their heels. "Happy hunting," the sheriff tells them, and Daryl thinks of his own dog back at the Hilltop and hopes his old friend's leg is healing nicely.

The sheriff narrates while they walk, almost as if he's giving a tour. "These were the original barracks. Well, a re-creation of the original barracks."

"Still a barracks?" asks Daryl, peering inside the brick structure. It sure looks like people are sleeping in those bunks.

"A number of the single men stay here. Others stay in the cabins of the ships."

Just beyond the barracks is a bulwark. "That cannon actually work?" Daryl wonders aloud as they walk inside the circular, defensive structure.

"It does," Garland replies. "They tested them on a small herd of cannibals once. If worse came to worse, and enemies breached the front gate and took the museum, we could retreat and defend ourselves from here. We could still preserve the settlement and the Indian village behind it."

Through one of the windows of the bulwark, in the distance, Daryl can see a graveyard littered with wooden crosses. The sheriff notices him looking and says, "There's only twenty-five, if you don't count the unmarked graves of executed criminals. The first year, they burned the bodies. Too many deaths from the cannibals and disease. But since then, there haven't been many losses. Fifteen died in that raid. One woman died in childbirth, one from a botched abortion she tried to perform herself. Two murdered men, one case of infant mortality, a stillborn, a hunting accident, or so I ruled it for the sake of the wife and children, though I'm pretty sure it was a suicide. One man managed to get bit by a cannibal while out scavenging, one drowned in the river swimming while drunk, and one died of natural causes. Have you had many losses?"

"Too many," Daryl mutters. The catalog of names scrolls though his mind.

"Mostly from cannibals and natural causes?"

"War, mostly."

"Even though you have that defensive alliance?" the sheriff asks. "Or does the alliance _get_ you into wars? An attack against one is an attack against all?"

Daryl's never thought about the alliance that way. But if Alexandria and the Hilltop had never encountered each other, maybe the war with the Saviors never would have happened. Even when their world was small, though, when it was just the prison, just Alexandria, there was still war – the Governor, the Wolves. "Sometimes we just been attacked for no damn good reason."

"Well, there's strength in numbers," Garland says as he leads them away from the bulwark. "In walls and forts. I take it you're more settled now? You have better defenses?"

"Still conductin' interviews?" Daryl asks.

"I'm just curious at this point. I'm showing you our world. Telling you about it. It means I trust you."

Later, the sheriff leads them through an opening in the fence to another section Daryl hasn't seen before, which is adjoined to the settlement with a trapezoidal, wood fence. Bleating fills the air, and they soon pass a sheep pen. A man sits on a stool shearing wool and says, "Mornin', Sheriff."

The sheriff tips his hat and replies, "Good morning, Glenn."

Daryl's heart twists at the old familiar name.

Next they pass a pen where pigs snort and rummage. A man tosses them slop from a tin bucket, looks at Daryl warily, and says, "Morning, Sheriff."

"Good morning, George."

They walk by a chicken coop next, outside of which a rooster struts, and then a garden, where two men and two women, including Shannon, are working. "Hey, baby," says Shannon, standing and slapping the dirt off her hands. "Looks like you're working hard."

One of the men, who is on his hands and knees yanking weeds, laughs. "Or hardly working. It's good to be sheriff."

"Trust me," Shannon tells him. "Garland works long, stressful hours. Can't tell you how many times he's been called out in the middle of the night to deal with some nonsense. Not to mention the near-death experiences. He deserves a morning stroll, don't you, baby?"

Garland smiles and gives her a kiss. When Shannon steps back, she looks at Daryl. "I'll be visiting Carol later. I'm going to bring her lunch. She's doing well."

Daryl nods. He wants to say, "Tell her I love her," but he's not sure if that would be weird.

The sheriff jerks his head to indicate Daryl should walk on. As they do, Daryl can feel the eyes of the gardeners on his back.

"That woman," Garland half whispers when they're beyond the plot, "the other gardener? _Both_ of those men are her husbands."

Daryl glances back over his shoulder at the gardening crew and then looks forward again.

"They all applied for an official declaration of marriage, and the jury in their case granted it. Set a precedent, I guess, because there was another official bigamist marriage a year later."

"Hell's the difference 'tween an official and an unofficial marriage?" Daryl asks.

"The legality affects work requirements with regard to distribution of rations, division of personal property upon death or divorce - that is to say, there are some legal benefits and protections. I won't bore you with the details. But _now_ anytime Shannon's ticked off at me, she threatens to take on a second husband."

Daryl snorts.

"You laugh, but there are at least sixty single men here who would leap at the chance, if she didn't come with a child and mother in tow, that is. That cools their jets a little."

"Yeah, well, her bein' married to the sheriff probably cools their jets, too."

"Indeed. Are women this scarce in your alliance?"

"Ain't too uneven." In fact, there might be _more_ women, given that Oceanside is still seventy percent female, but men have been moving there and women have been moving to the other communities as relationships form.

"Almost every woman here has a husband or steady boyfriend," Garland tells him. "Although there's one who's a lesbian, much to the dismay of the men. There are a couple who like to play the field. And then of course there are the prostitutes. They don't get daily rations because they don't do any work for the community, but they're paid in spades by their… " The sheriff seems to be trying to think of the right word. "Clients. Food, clothes, liquor, cigarettes."

"Cigarettes?" Daryl asks in surprise. He finally gave up smoking two years ago, when he couldn't find a cigarette that didn't crumble to dust when he tried to light it. He hasn't missed it as much as he thought he would. What he missed most was having something to do with his hands and something to mumble around, so he's learned instead to fiddle with his crossbow more often and to chew on straw.

"We grow a little tobacco. The Virginia soil is admittedly ideal for it. I proposed a law to forbid wasting fertile land on growing it, but the jury didn't approve it."

"That how ya make laws here?" Daryl asks. "Put 'em fore a jury?"

"Yes. Anyone in the government can propose a law as an amendment to the charter, but a jury has to approve the change. Then the captain can sign or veto it as he wishes. I proposed shutting the whorehut down three months after I became sheriff. That's when that prostitute died from the botched abortion. And I'm admittedly a bit concerned about public health. The condoms in inventory are all expired by now. Some of the men do make natural sheepskins, but I don't know how effective they are at preventing the spread of STDs. Unfortunately the lottery gave me a jury of six men, four of them single, and they quickly denied my proposed law. I _thought_ of reapplying. You can re-propose the same issue after six months has passed - but the captain made it abundantly clear to me that he would veto any jury decision to shut the whorehut down, so I didn't bother."

"So, is that the captain's main power?" asks Daryl. "Vetoin' shit?"

Garland nods. "Two years ago, the captain made it clear he'd veto any jury ruling granting admission to Shannon's people if they weren't bound to us in some clear way and if there wasn't someone working for their rations, which is why I proposed to her. Well, that and…" He glances back in the distance at his wife in the garden. "She's beautiful. Even pregnant as a house, she was." He looks forward again. "And smart as a whip." He chuckles and shakes his head. "She gave me a hard time in those interviews. Anyway, another man married the other pregnant woman from that camp, and took in her mother, like I took in Shannon's. So that was the women and infants and elders provided for. The orphans…well, we put kids age twelve and up to work, but we had to find volunteers to work for the rations of the younger ones. Shannon and I sponsor one, that little one I caught skipping school. Terrence. So I have to shovel shit on my day off, and she gardens extra hours beyond her required work week. We'd bring him to live with us, but it's tight quarters in our little cabin as is, and he likes being in the museum with the other kids."

"So if a jury's got to approve laws, how come the captain's got the power to tax?" Daryl asks. "Mean the tithe?"

"The tithe only applies to scavenged and seized goods, not to what's produced here. From production, he gets the same ration as anyone else. But yes, that scavenger's tithe was a change to the charter he proposed, and the jury voted to confirm it."

"But _why_?"

The sheriff looks around to make sure no one is in earshot. "I suspect they were bribed. But that was before my time here. And when I proposed getting rid of the tithe, the captain proposed demoting me if I didn't take the issue off the docket. That's his _real_ power. He promotes and demotes people within the government. The old sheriff was murdered, and one of the supply rooms robbed, about a month after I gained full admission here. I quickly solved the case, exposed the culprit, and recovered the stolen goods, and I guess the captain was impressed. That got me an immediate promotion to the job, which is third in the line of secession. It goes captain, manager, sheriff, commander, lieutenant commander, lieutenant, and liteutenant junior grade. There are seven of us in the government."

"Manager?" Daryl asks.

"He manages the farming and the fishing industries. He's sixty-nine and smokes like a chimney, so I don't know how long he'll live."

Daryl glances at the shadowed silhouettes of the women inside the greenhouse tent they're passing. He waits until they're beyond it to ask, "So yer just waitin' for yer time to come?"

Again the sheriff glances around, but they're in a barren area near the fence, with yards of dirt between them and the nearest activity. "It seemed the best choice," he says in a low voice. "The original navy men who secured this place are all loyal to the captain. There are sixteen of them still alive. The captain saved all their lives at the start when they were surrounded by a herd of cannibals they didn't think they'd ever get out of. Well, he saved the lives of the ones who lived, that is. A lot of navy men died that day, or so I'm told. The captain's a fighting machine. If anyone made an attempt at even a bloodless coup, it could get ugly. And if the coup did not succeed, well… the charter stipulates the death penalty for treason. It's not worth the risk, not when he's merely corrupt and incompetent rather than evil and oppressive."

Sherriff Garland has really opened up, and Daryl wonders if it's because he has a literally captive audience, a man he knows – one way or the other - won't be sticking around, a man who doesn't talk much and won't be blabbing.

They pause before another building. "This is the Factory," the sheriff tells Daryl. "It was used for trading, brewing, and other industrial activities in the original Jamestown."

The fruity scent of beer drifts from the open frame. "Still use it for brewin'?"

"Yes," Garland answers as he walks on. "And also we make moonshine there." Daryl matches his pace. "We still use it for trading, too. Sometimes people trade their rations with one another, or trade stuff they've scavenged or made. Aarav, he's a vegetarian, is always trading meat for beans and vegetables."

"Sounds like a shit trade."

"He certainly has a lot of willing takers."

"If ya make yer own alcohol," Daryl asks, "how come some of yer men wanted mine so bad?"

"Because it was better than what we make, and so it trades with higher value at the whorehut. And the alcohol rations here are small. We can only make so much. If I had my druthers, we'd make even less. There are better uses of barley and corn."

"Yeah, m'camp made me stop making ethanol from the corn for m'bike."

"You have a motorcycle?" the sheriff asks in awe. "One that _runs_?"

"Converted it to run on ethanol. Can still make a gallon every now 'n then, when they got rotten corn they can't use. Take m'bike for a spin sometimes. Not long. Not far."

"God what I wouldn't give for a good muscle car instead of a horse," the sheriff pines. "I used to have a 1998 Dodge Charger. Silver with a black racing stripe down the middle. Miss that damn car."

They've made it all the way around the trapezoidal perimeter and are headed back into the triangular section of the settlement now. They pass the old governor's mansion. "Six families live there now," Garland says.

Later they pass the sheriff's own cabin. "How'd ya get stuck with such a small house?" Daryl asks. "If yer the number three man?"

"Well, it was bigger when it was just me. It has two bedrooms. My mother-in-law and son are in one, and my wife and I are in the other. I prefer the seclusion of my own cabin. It feels more like a home. And I like the sounds of the settlement. It feels more like community. It keeps me closer to the bulk of the people, which keeps me better informed."

"Ain't like I care m'self. 'Fore a bedroom opened up in the Hilltop mansion, I used to sleep in the loft of the barn."

Sheriff Garland chuckles. "Now, that I would not like. The stench."

"Ya get used to it."

"You don't live with Carol?"

"Nah. Not…yet."

"Mhm, well," the Sheriff says as he strolls with his hands behind his back, "we have boxes and boxes full of jewelry if you want to look for an engagement or wedding ring. I'm sure we could easily spare one. Every now and then we melt them down for something."

Daryl murmurs an indecipherable response.

"Life is short," Garland tells him. "And he who hesitates is lost. Hell, I didn't know Shannon a week and a day before I married her, and that turned out well."

They're back at the jailhouse now. Garland uncuffs Daryl and unlocks his cell door.

"Got any more of them Louis L'Amour books?" Daryl asks after he walks inside.

"You read everything I gave you?"

"Nah. Just that one, 'n the detective story."

"The Raymond Chandler? Did you like it?"

"Yeah. 'S a'ight. Had it figured out on page twenty. Liked the western better."

"Well now that I know your tastes, I'll see what I can do." The sheriff clicks the key in the lock. "I'll be back in three hours or so with lunch and books. You want anything else? Jigsaw puzzle, maybe?"

Sometimes, in Daryl, that old, instinctive redneck need to perpetually defend his manhood flares up. "I look like the kind of pansy who puts together fuckin' jigsaw puzzles?"

"I don't know," the sheriff replies. "Do _I_?"

Daryl bites the inside of his mouth. _Shit._ The sheriff was offering him his _own_ jigsaw puzzles, apparently. "Sorry," he mutters. "Didn't mean to insult ya."

"It's a good way to wind down before the fire on a quiet evening. I've almost finished putting together the Mona Lisa. It's challenging. So much black."

"Mhm."

When the sheriff's in the doorway, Daryl grabs his cell bars and calls, "Hey, man, really didn't mean to insult ya. Thanks for tryin' to help us."

The sheriff turns around with a light smile on his face. "Don't worry. My ego has survived the blow." He tips his hat to Daryl and walks out chuckling.

Daryl picks up the pack of playing cards the sheriff left him, plops down on his unrolled sleeping bag, and begins playing solitaire on the dirt floor.


	29. Chapter 29

The guard is no longer outside of Carol's doorway. He now sits at the end of the hallway leading to the infirmary. Carol must have frightened the poor boy with her attempt at conversation yesterday. The doctor, however, is here to check on her. "Are you allowed to fraternize with uncleared foreigners?" she asks with a smile.

"Oh, I'm already ineligible for the jury pool, because I've been treating you, so you can talk to me as much as you like."

"Do you think the jury will release us?"

"I couldn't say. No one's applied for release since the raid." He leans back against the counter and crosses his arms over his chest. "Your vitals are looking good. The blood loss, even with the transfusion, has taken its toll, but I think you can get out of that wheelchair tomorrow and start doing some moderate walking. The stitches can't come out for another five or six days, so even if you _do_ win your release case tomorrow, I'd highly recommend you stay on until I can safely remove them. Riding horseback is vigorous, and you might pop a stitch, especially if you need to run from cannibals."

Carol's not sure about that. A few extra days at Jamestown followed by a more direct four-day journey home would still put them back at the Kingdom in time for her to prepare for the spring fair, but just barely. Jerry and Dianne, whom she left in charge in her absence, will be growing nervous and might even have sent out a search party. The Hilltop won't worry so much about Daryl, as he comes and goes as he pleases. But if they do win release, Daryl's going to want to leave as soon as possible. After all, he's been sitting in a cell. "If the jury releases us and the captain signs off, I think we best leave before he changes his mind."

"The captain can't veto a decision _after_ he's signed it," the doctor insists. "Please think about it, anyway, for your health."

Shannon interrupts their conversation. She's come with a lunch tray in her hands – fish, potatoes, cooked spinach, and a full glass of milk - and a drawstring bag over her shoulder.

The doctor excuses himself to go make a house call on a sick child, and Shannon settles the tray on the retractable desk over Carol's bed, shuts the door, and pulls up a chair. She pats the drawstring bag. "I brought you some entertainments in here. Word find book, crossword puzzle book, writing paper, some pencils. A _really good_ erotica novel. You're going to _love_ it."

Carol laughs. "I don't think I need that."

"Why?" Shannon asks. "Is Daryl _that_ good in bed?"

Carol almost spits out her milk but swallows it down and sets the cup on her tray. "I don't know honestly," she confesses. "We haven't gone that far yet." Carol has no idea why she shares that bit of information. Maybe it's because Shannon isn't someone she'll see again, once they're out of here, and they will get out of Jamestown – one way or the other.

"Whaaaat?" Shannon asks with such gleeful surprise that it makes Carol laugh again.

"We're taking things slowly," Carol tells her.

"I'll say. Didn't you say you'd known each other since the start? _Seven years_ slowly?"

"We've _known_ each other, but we only kissed for the first time less than two weeks ago."

Shannon chuckles and shakes her head. "Well, I waited until we were married to have sex with Garland."

"Didn't you marry him a week after you met him?" Carol asks as she cuts the white, flaky fish with her fork.

"Well, there is _that_."

"What was that like?" Carol asks. "Marrying a virtual stranger?"

"Like going to Vegas and betting it all on black jack. And winning."

Carol chuckles.

"We did actually talk when he was interviewing me. He had several private interviews with me. In retrospect I don't think their purpose was _entirely_ information gathering. We talked a lot about stuff that had nothing to do with anything. I figured he was making me comfortable to get to the bottom of things. But maybe he just enjoyed talking to me. Anyway, he seemed decent, and he looked pretty damn sexy too. Still does. Don't you think?"

"I…" Carol's fork freezes partway up from her plate. "I don't know how to answer that." She pops a bite in her mouth and chews.

"Oh, you know _exactly_ how to answer that," Shannon tells her. "The answer is _yes_. Your man's sexy, too, by the way. I mean, he looks like he could clean up a bit, but those are some very nice biceps."

Carol coughs. She takes a sip of milk to wash down this potato that seems to have lodged itself in her throat. Shannon's right, though, Daryl does have very nice biceps. Carol suppose any woman can take a gander, but those are only _her_ arms to touch. To run her hands all over. To kiss. And…Maybe she shouldn't be thinking about all this right now, when she can't even see Daryl for another day, let alone touch hm.

"Anyway, that first night," Shannon continues, "our wedding night? I was so pregnant and felt so huge. But Garland seemed to think I was the most beautiful thing on earth. He was as excited as sixteen-year-old boy in the backseat of a car. It had been a long time for him. A _long_ time. _Years_."

It's been years for Daryl, too, Carol thinks. And she has no idea _how many_ years. At least she _assumes_ it's been years. She's never actually _asked_. Maybe he had casual sex with someone at the Hilltop, but Carol can't imagine that. Unless the woman walked naked into his bedroom, and crawled into bed with him, she doesn't see how that could happen, because Daryl simply doesn't come onto anyone.

Shannon glances at the door, leans forward with green eyes twinkling, and says, "He did not last a minute."

"Oh." Carol's amused by the over-sharing.

Shannon sits back in her chair again. "At the time I was just relieved. I didn't know what he was going to want in bed or quite what I'd gotten myself into, and I thought, well, at least it will be _quick_. I can do my wifely duty in a jiffy and get on with my day, and he'll bring home the bacon while I'm laid up the first few weeks after the baby."

There were times Carol felt like that with Ezekiel - that quicker sex was better than drawn-out sex. She cared about the King and respected him, so she _wanted_ to want him. She had hoped all that sexual desire would flare up on their wedding night. It never really did. But it wasn't as if she had anything but worse to compare it to, either. But with Daryl…it all feels so different. It's like her flesh is tingling when he caresses her and her heart won't stop speeding up when he kisses her, like there's a fire being fanned between her legs when he cups her breasts, and she can't put that fire out except against him. She loves the slow make-out sessions they've been having, and she can't wait for the next one.

Shannon shrugs. "Of course it got better. _Much_ better, and quickly too. He just needed to gain some control. Want to hear a funny story?"

Carol smiles. "I _do_." This sure beats twiddling her thumbs alone in her hospital bed, anyway.

"So my mama was worried sick Garland was going to mistreat me and thought I shouldn't marry him, that maybe we should just take our chances on the captain's veto and a life out there. I did _not_. We share a cabin, and it's not that big. After that embarrassing early finish, Garland waited three nights to make another foray. And that one was pretty good, but then two days later, well…it was a lot more than pretty good. And I'm a bit of a screamer when it comes to good sex."

Carol is trying not to laugh, but she can feel a bit of pain her side where she was stabbed.

"Well, Mamma must have thought he was beating me, because she comes running in our bedroom with a kitchen knife, ready to take on the world and Sheriff Garland, and there we are naked as jaybirds, and I had to say – Mama, _that_ was an orgasm. She got all red and slammed the door shut. She didn't say a word to Garland or Garland to her for a full week."

Carol lets her laugh out.

"I thought she trusted him by then because he always treated her kindly. But I guess she always had one eye on him and a knife under her apron. Every man's got a story about his mother-in-law, I suppose."

"Not like that," Carol says.

"Third trimester hormones are something else. I was horny as hell once I knew the sex was going to be good. No surprise that baby came three weeks early. We're trying not to have another one, given the nature of things, and all the orphans already. Garland doesn't like sheepskins and frankly I don't either." Carol wonders if Shannon talks this openly with _everyone_. "So we've been using the rhythm method and doing _other stuff,_ you know, when it's the fertile time. You and Daryl are going to have to think about all that once you do start doing the horizontal tango."

Carol chuckles at the word choice. "I don't think I have to worry about that at this point. I'm over fifty. It's been four months since I last had a period."

"Happened to my mother. She had the worst time conceiving me, and I was born when she was forty. She never expected to have another one, let alone one at over fifty. She thought she was going through menopause and that she was out of the woods, and then, wah-lah! Along comes my little brother Ivan. He was twelve years younger than me." She sighs. "Or is. I wonder if he's still alive, surviving somewhere like this. He was in California when it started, with our father, touring UCLA. He was going to maybe go to college there. My mom likes to believe they're both alive, and so she's been trying to stay faithful to my father ever since the Great Sickness started. But she finally agreed to go to the manager's hut for supper tomorrow tonight. He's a younger man. By _six years_."

"The manager?"

"He manages the fishing and farming. He'll succeed the captain if the captain dies, but I doubt that will ever happen. The captain's much younger, and sometimes I think he's near invincible. The captain once survived a sword wound even nastier than that stab wound you're dealing with."

"Your husband isn't second in command?" Carol asks.

"He's third."

There are two raps on the infirmary door, and then it swings open. Sheriff Garland walks in.

"Were your ears burning, baby?" Shannon asks.

"Pardon?"

"I was just talking about you."

"All good things, I hope," he says.

"Only the best."

"Hmmm…." He murmurs doubtfully.

Carol notices immediately that he's well-dressed. He wears a solid black vest instead of his usual well-worn brown suede one over a pressed, white, button-down dress shirt that's tucked into a pair of black pants. A bolo tie of braided black leather is secured around his neck by an ornamental, silver clasp bearing the picture of an eagle. His white Stetson has been brushed free of dirt and his worn, white-and-black calfskin boots switched out for a recently shined pair of black leather dress cowboy boots.

Shannon notices, too. She looks him up and down. "Well _my_ don't you look handsome. Do we have a hot date I don't know about?"

Garland shifts his weight nervously from one foot to the other. "That divorce settlement was taken off the court docket. Davy and Kim decided to stick together. So Daryl and Carol's trial's been moved up."

"To when?" Shannon asks.

" _Now_. I'm here to get Carol."

Carol's heart thuds with excitement.

The sheriff rocks on his heels. "I wasn't expecting to testify so soon." He closes his eyes. Why does he look so nervous? Carol fully expected him to be as smooth as molasses in the courtroom. He's appeared calm, collected, and confident every moment she's seen him. But now he's gritting down tightly on his teeth, with his eyes shut just as tightly, rocking on his heels, and looking like he's about to lose it.

Shannon steps straight up to him and puts one hand on his arm and the other on his hip. He opens his eyes and looks into hers. "Breathe, baby," Shannon tells her husband. "You've got this." Sheriff Garland inhales a deep breath. "Let it out, honey." He blows the air out in one long stream. "You're going to do _great_ in that courtroom, Garland. I know you are. Just _breathe_ , baby."


	30. Chapter 30

The court room is in the old chapel. The altar has been replaced, whether temporarily or permanently, Daryl doesn't know, with a six-foot-long, white folding table and a large, black padded desk chair on wheels. On the table rests a wooden gavel and stand.

The bailiff, Earl, plops Daryl down on one of the short side pews on the stage, facing the bench. Earl then uncuffs him and says, "Might want to run your fingers through your hair or something." Daryl brushesaside the short bangs that have gradually been growing back since his last haircut at the hands of the Hilltop's barber.

A woman, maybe sixty, maybe seventy, Daryl can't guess, walks down the center aisle of the chapel, holding the handle of a black briefcase in her right hand. She wears wire-rimmed glasses, a black skirt, and a pink, ruffled blouse. Her white hair is tied up into a bun. She sets the briefcase on a small card table on the other side of the stage and then sits down in a metal folding chair so that she's facing the judge's bench and Daryl.

"Who's she?" Daryl asks.

"Court reporter," Earl replies. "She may be one of the few people left alive who can still write shorthand. But she's been teaching a class at the school. The next generation will know."

The woman opens her briefcase and pulls out a yellow legal pad, three pencils, and a handheld pencil sharpener. Without looking at Daryl, she begins to sharpen the pencils.

Earl stands silently by Daryl's pew until the sheriff appears, pushing Carol in a wheelchair, and then the bailiff heads out of the chapel.

"Good afternoon, Sheriff," the court reporter says.

"Afternoon, Marjory."

Carol looks good, Daryl thinks. Her cheeks are rosier than they were yesterday. The sheriff parks her wheelchair by the stage, gives her his arm, and helps her up to the pew, but then he sits between her and Daryl. He sits stiffly, like a starched shirt, and Daryl can feel the nervousness radiating off of him like a choppy wave. He must not be as comfortable in a courtroom as he is in an interrogation room, or maybe every time he sets foot in here, he thinks of the man he convinced the jury to release, the man who came back with an army by night.

Daryl leans over the sheriff to say to Carol, "How ya feelin'?"

"Better. The doctor wants me on bedrest today, but says I can start walking to – "

"- Enough chit chat," the sheriff interrupts. He closes his eyes and breathes out.

Daryl looks at Carol and nods at the sheriff, to silently ask what the hell is wrong with him, and she shakes her head ever so slightly to indicate her concern.

Daryl sinks back into the pew as Earl returns with twelve people in tow. The bailiff walks to the front of the church and gestures to the pews. Six people file into the first pew and six into the second.

"Thought ya said the jury was six people," Daryl whispers to Garland, whose eyes are open now.

"The second row is back-up jurors," Garland explains. "In case any in the front row have a conflict of interest." He looks over the faces in the jury pews and mutters beneath his breath, "Damnit to hell."

"What's the problem?" Carol asks. "Is it a bad pool?"

"I don't do as well with predominantly male juries." There's only one woman in the front row. "And two of the men in the front row lost loved ones in that raid two years ago. They may well be suspicious of someone who wants to be released."

The bailiff walks up onto the stage and announces, "Court is in session. The Honorable Captain John Smith presiding. All rise."

Scurrying sounds drift from the first two pews as everyone scrambles to their feet. Garland again lends his arm to Carol to help her up. The captain emerges from the sacristy, looking fully sober and impeccably dressed for a change, in a dark, Navy dress uniform with black, four-in-hand necktie, and his white-and-black U.S. Navy dress cap perched on his head.

Straw farmer hats, gray-and-blue fisherman's caps, and one baseball cap come off of heads. The sheriff removes his white Stetson and toys with it anxiously.

The captain rolls back the desk chair, takes a seat – almost filling it with his muscular width as his head rises inches above the back – and rolls it forward. He then picks up the gavel, smacks it two times on the wooden stand, and booms, "You may be seated." As people thud back down into their pews, the captain plucks his hat from his head and sets it on the table.

The bailiff walks up and stands just before the bench and reads from a sheet of paper: "Case number 784. April 17th, in the 7th year of the New Jamestown Settlement." A pencil scratches across yellow paper as the court reporter takes short hand. "Application for release on behalf of Carol Stuart and Daryl Dixon."

Daryl glances down the pew at Carol. He never knew her maiden name was Stuart. They aren't lying about anything anymore, including being married, so she must have told the sheriff her real name. That's not Ezekiel's last name, and it's not Ed's either. "The applicants were discovered on April 14th, in the 7th year of the New Jamestown Settlement, approximately three-and-a-half miles north of the front gates, and entered Jamestown for the purposes of emergency medical care. Jury selection will now commence."

The bailiff walks off the stage and stands in the aisle at the side of the chapel. One of the men in the jury pool is dressed in a navy work uniform of blue-and-gray camo. He has thick, silver hair and dark blue eyes. Daryl notices him because he's staring intensely at Carol, and Daryl doesn't like that one bit. Why is he looking at her like that? Because she's a woman in a camp with too few women? Or is he already silently judging her? "Last one in the first row," Daryl whispers to the sheriff. "He lose family in the raid?"

"No. Shh."

Daryl falls silent.

"Potential jurors, please rise," the captain booms. "And raise your right hands." The jurors rise and hold up their hands. "Do you swear to give full, honest, and truthful answers to any questions you are asked here today?"

"We do," they chorus.

"Please be seated." Bottoms thud onto padded pews. "Juror number one, please rise."

A lanky, blond man rises to his feet.

"Do you know of any conflict of interest, prejudice, or other reason that would disqualify you from service on this case?" The captain sounds like he's done this hundreds of times and that it bores him.

"I've got a poker tournament tonight."

"That's not a reason to shirk the duties of citizenry." The captain turns to Garland. "Any questions for this juror, Sheriff?"

"No questions, Captain."

"This juror is sworn," the captain announces.

"But Captain," the man protests, "I already bought in to the tournament for the whole week!"

"Sit down!" the captain roars, and the blond man sits down abruptly in the pew. "Juror number two, please rise," the captain orders. The only woman in the front row stands. She's pregnant and looks about ready to burst. "Do you know of any conflict of interest, prejudice, or other reason that would disqualify you from service on this case?"

She puts a hand on her belly. "Well, I've been having contractions for about an hour now. They're about ten minutes apart."

"What?" the captain barks. "What are you doing here, then?"

"I was told the fine for not showing up for jury selection is twenty percent of one week's rations," she replies.

The captain huffs and shakes his head. "You didn't really think we'd fine you if you were popping out a baby, did you?"

"I'm relatively new, sir. I just gained full-admission three weeks ago. I was with that small group found in the high school. This is my first time being summoned. I didn't know."

"Earl!" the captain orders the bailiff. "Get her back to her hut and send for the midwife."

"Yes, Captain."

"There goes the one woman," Garland mutters underneath his breath. Juror number seven, who comes from the second row to fill her vacated spot, is a man.

"Do you know of any conflict of interest," the captain asks the replacement juror, "prejudice, or other reason that would disqualify you from service on this case?"

"None, Captain."

"Good. Any questions for this juror, Sheriff?"

"No questions, Captain."

"This juror is sworn," the captain announces, and the replacement man sits down.

The captain orders the third juror to rise, asks the same question, and receives a "Nope. No reason."

"No reason, _Captain_ ," the captain corrects him.

"No reason, Captain," the man echoes. "Sir."

"Any questions for this juror, Sheriff?"

"No questions, Captain."

Daryl looks at Garland and then over him at Carol. She returns his gaze as though she has the same thought he does - Why doesn't the sheriff have any questions for these people? _Should_ he have questions for these people? Is he _too nervous_ to ask questions of these people?

"Juror number four, please rise."

A forty-something redheaded man stands up.

"Do you know of any conflict of interest," the captain asks, "prejudice, or other reason that would disqualify you from service on this case?"

"No reason, Captain," the man answers. "I'm honored to do my civic duty."

"Any questions for this juror, Sheriff?"

"Yes, Captain." Sherriff Garland answers and rises. Carol and Daryl exchange glances and then return their gazes to Garland as he walks to the center of the stage to look down at juror number four. He seems to have collected himself. He still _looks_ stiff, but he _sounds_ calm. "Andy, can you swear, before God almighty, that you have not already decided in your heart to rule against release in this case _regardless_ of the evidence that is presented here today? Can you say that, and honor the oath you swore in this courtroom today?"

This must be one of the men who lost family in the raid. Andy shuffles in place. He looks down at the dirt floor of the chapel and swallows. "No," he mumbles. "No I honestly can't say I won't be prejudiced."

"I move for dismissal of juror number four," Sheriff Garland announces, "on the grounds of partiality."

The captain picks up his gavel. "Juror number four is dismissed." He slams it on its wooden base. The dismissed juror scurries from the chapel, and juror number eight, a woman from the second row, comes to stand in his place.

"'S good, right?" Daryl whispers as Garland sits back down next to him. "Ya wanted more women?"

"No," Garland whispers back. "She lost her son in the raid. But I'll try to get her dismissed, too."

The captain repeats his routine, the woman answers there's no reason she can't serve, and the sheriff rises to pose the same question he asked of the last juror. But this woman replies, "I can. I believe, whatever my past experiences, that I can and will be fair and impartial in this case."

"The way you impartially wrote the words _murderous whore_ all over the towels you supplied my wife from the laundry when she first settled here?" Garland asks.

"That was a long time ago, Sheriff."

"I move to dismiss this juror."

"You have no grounds upon which to dismiss the juror," the captain replies. "So long as she swears impartiality."

"Captain," Garland says incredulously.

"Sheriff," the captain replies. "I repeat: You. Have. No. Grounds."

The sheriff sighs and sits down. "This juror is sworn," the captain announces and pounds his gavel. The female juror sits down.

The sixth juror is still looking intensely at Carol. Daryl glances at her and sees she notices. Carol leans forward slightly and squints her eyes to look at him.

The fifth juror is told to rise. "This one lost his brother in the raid," sheriff Garland murmurs. When it's his turn, sheriff Garland asks juror number five the same question he asked the other two who had lost family. Juror number five insists he has no prejudice and is permitted to remain on the jury over Garland's objections.

That makes two people on the jury who lost family in the raid, and one of them seems to have a vendetta against Sheriff Garland because he helped to admit the survivors of the raiding camp. Daryl doesn't see how they can win with a jury like this.

Now it's time for the sixth juror to rise, the one that's been staring at Carol. Daryl eyes him warily.

"Good afternoon, Commander," the Captain says.

"Captain," the man replies.

"Commander?" Daryl asks in a whisper. "He a naval officer?"

"Yes," Garland whispers back. "People in the government are subject to the jury lottery, too. Just not the captain, because he runs the court. Or me, because I investigate and testify."

The captain shoots Garland a warning look, and he falls silent. The captain then returns his attention to the commander. "Do you know of any conflict of interest," the captain asks, "prejudice, or other reason that would disqualify you from service on this case?"

"I think maybe so, Captain," the man replies.

Carol leans forward in the pew and her eyes widen slightly. Daryl looks from her to the man and back.

"And what's that, Commander?" the captain asks.

"I think I might know one of the applicants. That woman there." He points his finger at Carol. "The one the bailiff said is named Carol Stuart. I think I might know her from before the Great Sickness. Long before. In fact, I think maybe we used to date in junior high and high school."

Carol has slid forward almost to the edge of the pew now. "Harold?" she asks. "Harold Harrison?"


	31. Chapter 31

Daryl wants nothing more than to fly out of this pew and kick Harold Harrison's ass. He wants to smash the man's head through that stained-glass window depicting a dove with an olive branch in its mouth. This asshole, who took Carol to the Dairy Queen on their first date and then broke her heart when she was just sixteen years old, who dumped her because she wouldn't put out.

"I can't believe you're alive, Cary!" Harold exclaims.

 _Cary_? Oh no, Daryl does not like that. He does not like that nickname _at all._

"That you survived all this, and we both ended up here?" Harold asks. "What are the odds of that? It's like some kind of sign from God or something."

Sign from God? It ain't no damn _sign from God_ , Daryl thinks.

From his bench, the captain laughs. "Remarkable!" he cries. "That's one hell of a remarkable coincidence!" He shakes his head. "Commander, do you think your past relationship will prejudice your judgment in this case?"

"I don't know. I don't think so. I mean," Harold shrugs, "she dumped me and broke my heart, but that was a long, long time ago."

Carol purses her lips into a near frown.

"Is all this true?" the captain asks Carol.

"That we dated, yes. But _he_ dumped _me_."

Harold appears confused. "That's not how I remember it at all."

"Well, you must have a faulty memory," Carol says coolly.

"No, I'm pretty sure I remember it distinctly," Harold replies. "I was a madly in love sixteen-year-old boy. We'd been dating three years already, and I figured we'd end up married one day. I wanted so desperately to be closer to you. But you tore my heart out and stomped all over it."

Why isn't Garland interrupting? Why isn't he stopping this? "Object," Daryl whispers.

"Shhh."

"You told me I pressured you too much," Harold continues. "That I wasn't being a…gentleman. I think that's what you said. And that you were breaking up with me because you deserved to be treated like a queen."

The captain chuckles at that. "So you're saying you may have a conflict of interest," the captain asks, "based on grounds of overfamiliarity with the applicant?"

"Well," one of the male jurors who has already been sworn says, "sounds like _overfamiliar_ is exactly what they _weren't_!"

The captain guffaws, and his laughter reverberates in the rafters of the chapel.

"Stop this!" Daryl hisses angrily to Garland, who just _sits_ there.

"Because she _deserved_ to be treated like a _queen_!" another one of the male jurors roars.

The captain slaps the bench with his hand in laughter.

Harold looks embarrassed by the reaction, but most of the jury pool laughs along with the captain.

Carol's face has turned an unnatural shade of color – the color of humiliation mingled with anger. Daryl himself is starting to see yellow. He's angry at Harold for putting Carol in this position, angry at the captain and jury for laughing, but he's even angrier at the sheriff for letting this all go on.

Finally Sheriff Garland rises, languidly. He strolls toward the bench and holds up a hand until the laughing fades to a stop. "Captain," he says, "I move to strike the _entire_ jury pool for this outburst. It's clear the pool has been poisoned against the applicant."

The captain sits back in his desk chair and bounces in place. He laughs, sharply, once, but then says, "This _is_ a bit of a mess, isn't it?"

"I apply for a fresh pool of jurors," Garland insists.

"Well, you have that right based on the current situation." The captain picks up his gavel and says, "Motion granted." He slams his gavel down on the stand. "This jury pool is dismissed."

Daryl's anger at the sheriff dissipates like mist. Garland was waiting to object _on purpose_. He wanted a scene. He wanted something that would pollute the entire jury pool, so he could throw the dirty water out.

[*]

Court is temporarily adjourned so the next twelve jurors in the lottery can be rounded up and jury selection can continue. The court clears out, except for Daryl, Carol, Garland, and the bailiff.

"Why don't you go on home and take a rest, Earl?" Garland tells the bailiff. "I'll get Daryl back to his cell. But if you would, stop by the garden and ask Shannon to come get Carol to bring her to the infirmary."

"Why?" Carol asks as Earl leaves. "How long is this going to take?"

"A while," Garland tells her. "The potential jurors have to be located and gathered from work – the fields, the docks, the ships…But it will give me more time to practice my opening statement."

"Ya a'ight, man?" Daryl asks. "Ya seemed a little nervous up there."

"I just don't like public speaking," Garland says. "Never have. No matter how many times I do it."

"Ya seem so calm interrogatin' people."

"That's different. It's just…it's different. But don't worry. I'll be fine."

"So," Daryl asks, "yer like a cop _and_ a lawyer?"

"Only in cases like these," Garland replies. "In criminal cases, there's a defense attorney and a prosecutor, and I just testify."

"Think this next jury will be better?" Carol asks.

"I sure hope so," Garland answers. "We wouldn't have won with that one. Not with that woman who blames me for her son's death and hates my wife, and not with that man who still resents my decision to release that spy. And not with someone whose heart you broke."

"That's not how that happened," Carol insists.

Garland glances toward the chapel doorway. "I'm going to go look out and see if Shannon's almost here." The sheriff stands in the doorway with his back to them. He's giving them some privacy and a chance to talk even though he's not supposed to.

Daryl sits down sideways at the end of one pew facing Carol in her wheelchair. "Ya a'ight? After…all that?"

Carol sighs. "You know, the more I think about it…I think maybe I might have actually said that thing to Harold about deserving to be treated like a queen."

"Well ya do!" Daryl insists. "Hell, should of told 'em ya _are_ a queen now!"

Carol chuckles. But her amusement quickly fades. "That was so humiliating."

"Garland had to let it go on," Daryl mutters softly.

"I know," Carol replies. "I know exactly what he was doing. And it worked."

"Want me to kick his ass for ya? Harold's?"

"I don't think that will assist our case."

Daryl puts a hand on the arm of her wheelchair and pulls it close, until their knees are touching. "Missed ya." He glances toward the doorway to make sure Garland still has his back turned and leans in for a kiss.

Daryl ends up standing up and bending down to kiss Carol better, and she buries her hands in his hair. Their lips smack and their tongues tangle in hungry need. Daryl cups her face with his hands while she tugs at his hair.

"Two minutes," Garland warns, and their mouths break apart, but they push their foreheads together as they catch their breath.

"I feel so naughty," Carol whispers. "Making out in church."

Daryl smiles. Sometimes he's reminded how tender her heart is, how much innocence still swims beneath the surface shell that has been toughened by years of harsh experience. "I love ya," he whispers. "Meant that when I said it. On the road. Just want ya to know. 'N case…Dunno."

"I know," she assures him. "I love you, too." She kisses him softly, until Garland says, "Time."

[*]

Garland returns Daryl to his cell and leaves. Daryl does a lot of pacing before he settles down on his bench and tries to read. The sheriff has left him more books. He picks up the collection of _Aesop's Fables_ and turns to the one Garland mentioned to him earlier as a reason for wanting to help him, _The Lion and the Mouse_.

Daryl reads about a mouse that is caught beneath a lion's paw and begs to be freed. "Please let me go," the mouse pleads, "and someday I will repay you."

The lion, amused, lets the mouse go. One day, the lion finds itself trapped in a hunter's net. The mouse comes upon the lion and gnaws through the ropes holding down the net, thus freeing the trapped creature.

At the bottom of the short fable is a moral in italics: _A kindness is never wasted._

Daryl shuts the book and resumes his pacing, feeling like a trapped animal himself.

[*]

Shannon parks Carol's wheelchair outside the barn and helps her into a standing position. They go inside, and as much as Carol hates to admit it, her side aches when she walks. Her horse whinnies happily to see her, and Carol coos to him while she strokes the stallion's nose. Beside Carol's horse, Freckles neighs.

"Daryl misses you, too," she assure the mare. She looks around. "Looks like they're being fed well."

"They got a makeover from the groomsman, too, and a little checkup from our veterinarian. All good. Come on. I've got to get you back to the infirmary. Time for you pain medication."

"I have to get used to the pain."

"Not _today_ you don't."

Carol insists on walking to increase her stamina, but she only makes it to the exit in the fenceline surrounding the settlement when she has to admit she needs the wheelchair. Her side has really started to ache. Shannon wheels her on the path past the fields. When they get to the docks, there's a lot of whistling and cat calling from _The Discovery,_ which looks like it's getting ready to set sail.

"Settle down, boys!" a man who is about to board the ship yells up.

The whistling stops suddenly.

The man turns toward them. It's Harold. He used to have solid black hair, instead of this striking silver, which was why Carol didn't recognize him. That and he used to be sixteen and not quite so lean.

"Hello, Commander," Shannon says.

"Your friend here and I, we used to date." Harold gestures to Carol.

"Is that so?" Shannon asks skeptically.

"It's true," Carol says. "A long time ago."

"8th, 9th, and 10th grade," Harold explains. "I'm sorry, Cary, about what happened during jury selection this morning. I didn't mean to embarrass you."

"Well, you succeeded," Carol tells him.

"Yeah. I succeeded in embarrassing _myself_ , too." He smiles so affably that Carol remembers why she used to like him, why she'd write her first name with his last name a thousand times in her math spiral when she was supposed to be doing pre-algebra problems. _Cary Harrison. Carol Harrison. Carol Anne Harrison._ She'd come up with names for their kids, too: _Benjamin Harrison. Sophia Harrison. Lancelot Harrison._ Daryl would roll his eyes at that last one. Ezekiel would have loved it. "But good luck with your case. I hope I didn't ruin it for you."

"You may have helped, actually," Carol admits, "inadvertently."

"I really _was_ heartbroken when you dumped me," Harold tells her. "I _know_ I was pressuring you. I know I was. And that's wasn't right. But, damn Cary. _Three years_."

"I was _sixteen_ ," Carol replies. "I wasn't ready. But it all worked out in the end, didn't it? With Kimberly Jansen."

"Who?"

Carol rolls her eyes. "The girl you dumped me for because she would put out." Although, to be fair, Carol is no longer _entirely_ sure who dumped whom.

Harold shakes his head. "Well, I don't remember any Kimberly Jansen but I sure remember you. You were my first love."

"Harold," Shannon says in the voice of a scolding mother, "you are not going to be rekindling any 8th grade romance here, so you can just step right on aside."

A navy man whistles down from the deck on the boat above. "Commander! Daylight's wasting, sir!"

Harold nods to Carol and then goes to board the boat.

"Harold's not so bad." Shannon says as she wheels Carol on. "He was on the jury that decided to admit my people. Garland likes him."

"Really?"

"Well, he doesn't _like_ him. That's not the right way to put it. Garland doesn't really like other men. He doesn't have a lot of what you'd call _friends_. He _ranks_ them. And he thinks Harold is the most competent of all the navy men. Why Harold wasn't promoted to captain at the start, and we ended up with John, I guess we'll never really know. That happened before either of us got here. I can't believe you two _dated_."

"It was a long time ago, and now I'm not even sure if I remembered it all correctly."

"Memory is a fickle thing. I was so sure my grandfather smoked a pipe, that he always had one his mouth, and yesterday my mama told me he'd never smoked a pipe in his whole damn life."

[*]

It's over three hours before Earl comes for Daryl and leads him to the courtroom. Daryl nods to Carol as Earl sits him down in the pew. She's already seated. The same routine plays out as before. Garland only objects to two jurors, one of whom is dismissed, and soon there are six jurors sworn in. But by the time the jury is selected, shards of colored light are bathing the pews in pretty patterns as the rays of the sinking sun penetrate the stained glassed windows.

The captain closes the court for the day, saying they'll reconvene first thing in the morning to hear testimony and pose questions. "No talking about the case between tonight and tomorrow," he warns the jurors. "And you're excused from work so long as you're in this courtroom. You'll still receive your regular rations."

One of the jurors raises a hand. "I have night patrol. Should I still work it? I might fall asleep during testimony?"

"Sheriff?" the captain asks.

"Jimmy can cover for him. He needs to makeup a day from being sick last week."

The court clears out again, except for Daryl, Carol, and Garland, who has sent the bailiff to get Shannon. "I like our chances better with this jury," Garland tells the couple.

"It's more balanced," Carol notes, "like you wanted." The jury has three women and three men.

"But that kid, the one looks 'bout fifteen?" Daryl asks. "He lost his dad in the raid?"

"He's seventeen," Garland replies. "That's the youngest you can be and still serve on a jury. But he might really be impartial like he claims. His girlfriend is one of the orphans from the raiding camp. They just started dating two months ago. I think our chances are good. The trial should take two hours in the morning, and we might have a decision by evening. If not, then by the next morning at the latest."

Carol and Daryl exchange hopeful glances.

Garland returns to the doorway again, his back to them, to "watch" for Shannon, and the couple takes the opportunity to steal a few more kisses.

[*]

It's after sunset when Carol finally gets dinner in the infirmary. Shannon brings it to her. "If you want to try walking again tomorrow," she says, "we can, but you aren't walking _all the way_ to the courtroom. I'll bring the chair for when you get tired."

"It's just a stab wound," Carol insists.

"You lost a lot of blood, girl," Shannon tells her. "A lot. Listen to the doctor."

"I guess I don't recover from wounds as quickly as I used to."

"How many wounds have you _had_?" Shannon asks.

"Well, I was shot once."

"And you _survived_? In this day and age?"

"That's how I found the Kingdom. They took me in and helped me."

"Well don't make it a habit to find civilizations that way," Shannon quips.

"Do you think we'll win this case?"

"Garland said he likes the jury."

"What about the captain?" Carol asks.

"Well, the captain's a bit of a wild card. He did catch some flack for signing off on the release that lead to the raid, though not _much_. It was mostly Garland who got an earful for recommending release. And even though we were admitted here, my people were not well received at first by everyone. As you can imagine. We received some very nasty, negative attention the first month we were settled here."

"The incident with the towels came up in the courtroom," Carol says. "That woman would have been on our jury, if Garland hadn't gotten the entire pool thrown out.

"Oh. _Cassandra_. I _know_ she was angry," Shannon mutters. "She lost her son and had every right to be angry, but I didn't kill anyone. And _whore_? Because I married a good man? That does _not_ make me a _whore_." She sighs. "Or maybe the insult hit a little too close to home. My motives for marrying _were_ pretty mercenary at first."

"Listen," Carol tells her, "thank you for calming Garland down. He was good in that courtroom, just like you told him he would be."

"Oh, honey, you don't have to thank me for loving my husband. That just comes natural. But you might want to thank me for the _fantastic_ blow job I'm going to give him tomorrow morning to relax him before the trial."

Carol laughs so hard she's afraid she might pop a stitch.

[*]

"How ya feelin'?" Daryl asks the next morning when Shannon parks Carol's wheelchair by the side pew where he already sits. Shannon walks to the back of the chapel to talk to Garland.

"I walked from the infirmary to halfway down the docks before I started aching," Carol replies. "I had to have Shannon wheel me the rest of the way. I don't think I recover as quickly as I used to. But I _am_ getting better."

"Sheriff looks a lot more relaxed today," murmurs Daryl, nodding to the back of the church.

Carol covers her mouth to stifle a laugh.

"So funny?" he asks.

"Nothing," she says and falls silent as the bailiff begins to lead the jury in and Garland returns to sit between them.

The bailiff orders all to rise. Garland closes his eyes and takes in a deep breath, and Carol feels like doing the same. The trial is about to begin.


	32. Chapter 32

Everyone in the courtroom is sworn-in at once, and the captain asks Daryl to approach the bench. He does, cautiously.

"Is it correct that you are, of your own accord, applying for immediate release from Jamestown?" the captain asks.

"Yeah," Daryl mutters. "Am."

"I am, _Captain_ ," the captain corrects him.

Daryl has to stop himself from growling. Forcing his voice to sound as deferential as it is capable of sounding – which isn't very – he says, "I am, Captain."

"And is it correct that you are applying for immediate release from Jamestown _in order_ to return to your own camp?"

"I am…Captain."

"You will be called back for jury questioning later, but you may return to your seat now."

The captain calls Carol next, and Garland wheels her to the bench. When asked the same question, she politely replies, "Yes, Captain, sir," sounding very much like cookie Carol to Daryl. "I am."

"And is it correct that you are applying for immediate release from Jamestown in order to return to your own camp?"

"I am, Captain, sir."

"You will be called back for jury questioning later, but you may return to your seat now. Sheriff, approach."

After the sheriff returns Carol to the pew, he approaches the bench.

"Have you completed your investigation and interviews to your satisfaction?" the captain asks.

"I have, Captain."

"And is it true that you recommend this couple for release from Jamestown, without the necessity of any further interrogation or observations?"

"I do, Captain."

"And is it true, that in your professional estimation, they will pose no threat to Jamestown upon their release?"

"In my professional estimation, Captain, they will not."

"You may now present your evidence to that effect."

The sheriff stands near the bench and faces the jury. He clears his throat more than once before he finally begins speaking, but when he does, he projects well and speaks with seeming confidence:

"There's no question in my mind, and nor should there be in yours after seeing the evidence I will present here today, that Carol Stuart and Daryl Dixon came to Jamestown from two camps near Washington, D.C." The sheriff points outwards, as if pointing in the far distance. "Camps that are over a hundred fifty miles away, far too far away to be of any threat to us. They clearly made this journey solely for the purposes of spending time together, researching Carol's roots, and scavenging goods, and they had every intention of returning to their camps by May. In fact, it's imperative that Carol return to her camp by May, as she is the leader of that camp and has important business to conduct that month. We have nothing to fear from these people, or from their camps, and we should allow them to return home as soon as possible to their families and their people. That is my recommendation."

Sheriff Garland recounts what he has learned in the course of his "interviews" and submits as evidence the ledger page from the Civil War hospital house in Dumfries, the grave rubbing from Staunton, the records from the Jamestown museum's historical archives, and the maps. He calls Thomas, the field medic who stopped Carol's bleeding, to the stand, _the stand_ being a folding chair near the judge's bench. Thomas testifies that they found Carol stabbed by an escaped convict from Jamestown, and that she was in sincere need of immediate medical attention.

"So she asked to be brought into the gates?" one of the jurors inquires.

"No, she was too injured to talk much at all," Thomas replies.

"So her man – " the juror, a blonde woman, points to Daryl, "asked you to bring her in?"

"No. He asked us to stop her bleeding. The sheriff made the call to have me bring her in to have her treated in the infirmary."

"So they weren't seeking admission to begin with?" a brunette juror asks. "They weren't _trying_ to get in through our gates?"

"No, not to my knowledge," Thomas says.

"I can answer that they have not sought admission since they have been here," Sheriff Garland says. "They have sought only to leave."

"Sheriff," the captain warns, "The juror's question was not addressed to you."

"Yes, Captain."

After Thomas steps off the stage, the sheriff calls Dr. Ahmad to the stand, and the doctor tells the jury that Carol was absolutely in need of medical care and "nearly died." He says he had the "privilege" to chat with her, and that he thinks she's "sincere in her gratitude for the life-saving assistance of Jamestown" and that she "has no reason to mean us any ill will whatsoever. As much as I would hate to lose such a cheerful patient…" He smiles toward Carol, "I do think we should allow her and…her…friend to return home without the need of any further interrogation. _However_ , I would _strongly_ recommend that she stay on until her stitches are removed in four to five days."

Daryl glances at Carol. She's more beat-up than he realized. Either that or the doctor's sweet on her. Or maybe both.

"Who would earn rations for them, then, if they stayed on a few more days?" one juror wants to know. "Can Carol work?"

"Well, no," the doctor replies. "I don't recommend she even ride until her stitches are out, let alone do any hard labor, but my understanding is we've confiscated a great deal of supplies from them that are sufficient to compensate for her medical care, room, and board."

"But we only get three-tenths of those supplies!" one juror, a black man in overalls, exclaims. "All 590 of us who weren't there to take them in and get a finder's fee. 1/590th of three-tenths of something ain't shit to us!"

There's a murmur of agreement from the rest of the jury.

"If you're concerned about consumption, Billy," the sheriff interupts, "then you probably want to vote for _release_ , because _release_ would certainly mean they'd be consuming _less_ than if they stayed on for further interrogation or observation. If they're released, they won't be _here_ to _consume_. And if Daryl is left under lock and key longer to be interrogated, he won't only be consuming, but he won't even be working."

"Sheriff!" the captain warns brusquely. "You're on thin ice with that line of address. Once again, the juror's question was not addressed to you."

"Yes, Captain."

Dr. Ahmad is dismissed from the stand when there are no further questions from the jurors.

"Are there any more juror questions for the sheriff?" the captain asks.

"What makes you so confident," the eighteen-year-old who lost his father asks, "that they won't come back with their entire alliance and try to invade us?"

"Because their alliance is prosperous already," Sheriff Garland answers. "As is evidenced by the quality of their horses and saddles and horse shoes. And it would be a long journey and a great risk to invade us for a reward they don't even _need_ to survive. Their alliance is spread out over four camps, and it still totals fewer people than us. They couldn't send enough people here to defeat us even if they wanted to, and they aren't desperate enough to want to."

"How do you know they're telling the truth about that?" the young man asks.

"Because the evidence corroborates their story in its particulars, as I have shown."

"Have you caught them in any lies?" the young man asks.

Garland rocks back on his heels and then stands forward. He swallows but speaks calmly. "Yes. They lied to protect their camps before they realized we're not the type of community to raid camps."

"Then how do you know they're not lying now?" the brunette juror asks.

"I recorded a private conversation between this couple that indicated they had been lying to protect their communities."

"And why haven't we heard that tape?" another juror asks.

"I can play a portion of it now."

"You can play the _whole_ tape, Sheriff," the captain insists as he gestures to the bailiff.

"Before I play this tape," Garland says, taking it from the bailiff who has been handling the evidence. "I will warn you that Carol does admit to lying on it. Don't allow that to prejudice you. Listen carefully to the conversation and observe _why_ Carol says she lied."

After playing the whole tape, the Sheriff rewinds. "I want to highlight this particular part for you again." It takes him a bit of squeaking forward and back to find it, but he does:

 _I told him our camp had about five hundred people_ , comes Carol's voice from the recorder, _because we know Jamestown has six hundred. I figure that this way, they'll feel the Kingdom is a good match and not worth the risk of invading us, and we can keep our people safe, in case these people aren't really as friendly as they appear to be_.

The sheriff clicks the tape player off. "As you can hear, the only reason for their lies was to protect their people, the very same way we would seek to protect our people. But they don't want to raid us, and we don't want to raid them."

There are no more questions for the sheriff, and so Carol is called to the witness stand. "Wish me luck," she murmurs to Daryl as Garland wheels her out.

 **[*]**

"Are you really the leader of your camp?" a bald, male jurors asks.

"Yes, I am," Carol answers.

"But you're a woman!" he exclaims.

It suddenly hits Carol that there are no female leaders in Jamestown. From the captain to the manager to the sheriff to the commissioned naval officers - everyone she's seen or heard about in any kind of position of authority has been a man. The women work alongside the men in the fields and the gardens and on the docks, but the camp's head doctor is a man, the field medic was a man, in fact, everyone in the sheriff's posse was a man. Women can serve on juries, clearly, and that gives them some influence in decision making, but every authority figure here is a man.

The world Carol lives in – where she leads the Kingdom, and Michonne leads Alexandria, and Cyndie leads Oceanside, and where Maggie once lead the Hilltop….it would be absurd to them. They wouldn't believe it if she said it.

So she gives them an answer that is truthful but incomplete. An answer that she thinks will comfort them. "Well, my husband was the ruler of our camp. He was regarded as their king, and because I married him, I was regarded as their queen. So when he died, I became the sole leader."

"Oh," the man says. "That makes more sense."

"Oh!" the blonde female juror exclaims. "So _that's_ why you could just leave and go on a road trip? Because you're kind of a figurehead? And someone else is really running the place?"

"There is someone else running the place in my absence," Carol tells her, which is also the truth, even if it's a carefully worded truth. She doesn't tell them she's far from a figurehead, because believing that seems to make them more inclined to believe her road trip story.

The jurors nod, like it all makes sense now.

"But why would you take the risk of cannibals and bandits and the road just for some family souvenirs?" the black man in overalls asks.

Carol observes he has a wedding ring, so she gambles he knows something about love. "That wasn't the only reason I took this trip," she says, glancing at Daryl who still sits on the pew. "I wanted a chance to spend some time alone with an old and dear friend, a man I love, so that we could have a chance to clarify our relationship."

"And did you clarify it?" the blonde juror asks.

"Yes, I think so. We're together now."

"So you're engaged?" the blonde asks.

Carol opens her mouth and then closes it again. "We're together," she repeats.

"Not till he puts a ring on it, sweetheart," the brunette juror says, and the blonde juror laughs.

"Order!" The captain slams his gavel.

The laughter fades.

"Do you have a lot of weapons?" a juror asks.

"Fewer than Jamestown," Carol answers honestly.

"Do you have any family back home?" the brunette asks.

"I have an adopted son."

"You _left_ your _son_ for a _road trip_?" the blonde juror exclaims.

"He's grown. He's a young man now." Carol doesn't tell them he's only sixteen. "He lives in another camp in the alliance now, to be near his girlfriend, but we see each other when we can. I'm anxious to get back because we're supposed to be seeing each other in May. He's coming home for a visit, and I admit I've been feeling like a bit of an empty nester." She looks at the gray-haired woman when she says this, hoping she's had children grow up and can relate. The woman nods.

"Just the one son?" the bald man asks. "No other relatives?"

"There are children in my camp I consider to be nieces and nephews, men and women that are like brothers and sisters to me."

The jurors questions fly like a barrage of arrows, and then come to a sudden stop. Carol, relieved, returns to her spot near the pew.

[*]

Daryl is called up for questioning next, and he's nervous. He's not sure he can be as smooth as Carol was.

"Why don't you and Carol live together in the same camp, if you're a couple?" the brunette juror asks.

"Uhh…" Daryl's eyes flit to Carol and then back. "Ain't been a couple that long. Mean, been good friends forever. Since the start almost. Just ain't been…more 'n friends."

"She said they just hooked up on the trip here," the eighteen-year-old male juror reminds the woman.

"But now you'll be settling in the same camp?" the brunette asks.

"Uh….Dunno."

"I mean, you're not the leader of your camp, right?" she asks.

"Nah."

"So you could just leave it."

"Uh…"

"Do you have family in your camp?" she wants to know.

"Got a kid I look out for. Ain't mine. Kind of belongs to the whole camp. But, 'm like…his uncle. 'N there's a kid in another one of the camps. Been lookin' out for her since she was born. 'M like an uncle to her, too. 'N like Carol said – got a lot of people who're like brothers and sisters to me."

"Even if you and Carol were just really good friends," the bald man asks, "why didn't you live in the same community as her? I mean, why wouldn't you want to be in the same camp as your good friend?" He looks around at the other jurors. "That's kind of suspicious, isn't it? I mean, what if they aren't a couple at all and they were just sent as spies from separate camps by their alliance?"

Daryl glances toward the side pew because he doesn't know what to say to that. Garland just mouths – _honesty_. So he looks back at the jury and says, "'Cause she married someone else, 'n I couldn't stand to see 'er with 'em every damn day." Out of the corner of his eye, he can see a look of pained surprise on Carol's face.

The blonde juror says, "Awwwww."

"Your alliance," the bald man asks, "can other camps enter into it? Or is it closed?"

"Uh…" he glances at Carol, who nods almost imperceptibly. "Guess, other camps _could_ ," he says. "Mean, if we found other camps wanted to, 'n we trusted 'em, but that alliance was forged for common defense. 'Cause one or the other of us, we'd get attacked."

The young man who lost his father in the raid speaks next. "You said you would get attacked, but did you ever go on the offense against another camp? Did you ever strike first?"

"Nah," Daryl says, although he's not quite sure how to categorize their slaughter of the sleeping Saviors. "Not without provocation."

"What kind of provocation?" the teenager asks.

"Extortion. Tryin' to take everyone's shit."

"You mean," the young man says, "like _we_ took _your_ shit when we brought you into Jamestown?"

 _Oh….fuck._

What has he done?

Daryl glances to his right at the pew where Carol and Garland sit. Carol winces, and Garland slowly closes his eyes.


	33. Chapter 33

"Nah," Daryl hastens. "Not like that at all! Y'all helped m'Carol. Saved 'er life. I'd gladly give ya _anything_ for that. _Everything_. I'd give you everything I owned in the world for keepin' her alive!"

Two of the female jurors smile as if touched.

"What yer people did, ain't _nothin'_ like what these people did." Daryl doesn't think about the order of events, doesn't tell the jury that they killed those sleeping Saviors before half the things he's about to say happened, or before he knew about them happening. It's all jumbled up in his mind now, and it comes pouring out: "These people…they wanted all the other camps to slave for 'em, without givin' 'em nothin' in return. Wanted us to give 'em a tenth of everything we had, not just once, but a tenth of everything we grew or scavenged or made, _forever_. If ya didn't agree to pay, they'd take a man 'n beat 'em to death right in front of ya, just to send a message. Beat one of my best friends in the world to death. Glenn was a husband. 'Bout to be a _father_."

The black man on the jury shifts uncomfortably and toys with his wedding ring.

"They shot a teenage boy, just 'cause the Kingdom was short one damn cantaloupe!"

The eighteen-year old tenses in his seat.

"When they put me in a cell, after they beat m'friend to death, they fed me dog food, not fish and cornbread. Didn't bring me clean clothes. Stripped me naked. Didn't give me books to read. Tortured me with this" Daryl waves a hand by his head. "Painful music. Same damn song. Over 'n over. 'N they were extrotin' _all_ the camps. Hell, one of the camps, when they wouldn't pay, them assholes killed _every single man_ in it."

There's a gasp from all of the female jurors.

There's deathly silence after that.

"Do any of the jurors have any more questions for this witness?" the captain asks.

Maybe they're stunned by Daryl's story, but not one even half raises a hand or asks anything else.

"Then this court is adjourned." The captain strikes his gavel on the stand.

Daryl looks around, confused by the abrupt ending. On the T.V. shows, there were always closing statements.

[*]

The jury remains in the chapel for deliberations, and so Garland returns Daryl directly to his cell.

"Did I fuck it up with what I said?" Daryl asks as Garland swings his cell door shut. "On the stand? Did I fuck over the case?"

Garland sighs. "Well…you backpedaled pretty well. There's not a person on that jury who would compare themselves to _those_ people you dealt with. And you made it pretty clear how grateful you are to us for saving Carol. So…that will help."

"What do ya think our chances are?"

"I don't honestly know," Garland replies. "Seems like the jury could go either way."

"And the captain?"

"On the one hand, he doesn't want to keep supplying y'all food. On the other…he doesn't want a repeat of the raid. But if he just signs whatever the jury rules, he can largely avoid responsibility by saying he went with them."

Daryl plops down with a sigh on his bench. There's nothing to do now but wait.

 **[*]**

Shannon drags the folded-up wheelchair behind herself as Carol walks. "I guess you won't be using this anymore."

"I have to get my strength back." Carol's still reeling from the court testimony, from what Daryl said about doing anything for her. She already knew it was true, but hearing him _say_ it like that – it set her heart to racing and fanned her need to be with him.

She's also reeling over what Daryl said about his captivity at the hands of the Saviors. Those were details he never revealed to her, though she did learn, eventually, of his imprisonment. She chose to imagine it as something tamer, or, more accurately, not to imagine it at all.

She doesn't want to think about him, naked and hungry and feeling like he might be going mad in Negan's cell. So instead she asks Shannon, "Do you have any women in your government?"

"The hierarchy is all men," she replies. "The captain's at the top. Then there's the manager, followed by my husband. Next there's your ex-boyfriend. Commander Harold Harrison. He's number four. It goes on down from there, to the lieutenant commander, the lieutenant, and the two lieutenant, junior grades."

"Why no women?"

Shannon shrugs. "I never really thought about it. I've never lived in a camp where it was any other way. The strongest, toughest men are usually the leaders. Isn't that just the world we live in now?"

"It's not the world I live in."

"At least we have a charter here. Consistent ways of doing things. Trial by jury. There's law and order, and, most of the time, justice."

"That certainly counts for something," Carol agrees.

"People were always stealing from us in my first camp. In the second, the only thing keeping me from rape was my second husband Tyrone. That's why I got with him in the first place. For protection." Shannon looks at Carol a little wide eyed. "Oh God, I _do_ sound _mercenary_ , don't I?" Carol doesn't comment. "But he didn't hurt me, and he kept me and my mama alive, until he got himself killed foolishly raiding this place. I _tried_ to talk him out of it."

"And why did you marry your first husband?" Carol asks.

"That one was for love, when I was fresh out of college, and it ended badly. Five years I gave him, and he cheated on me. So when the Great Sickness started, I was _already_ unromantic. But they say the third time's a charm."

"Daryl would be my third husband," Carol observes, "if we ever got married. But I don't think he's the marrying kind."

"Seems like the _staying kind_ though. I mean, _seven years_? In the Great Sickness? And he's been there for you the _whole_ time, one way or another?"

Carol smiles. "We've been there for each other. Mostly. He left once, but he came back. And I was _made_ to leave once. But I came back anyway. And then I _almost_ left once, but he stopped me. And then I _did_ leave, but he found me. And then he left, but I visited him. And then…I don't know. It's complicated."

"Sounds like. Are you going to simplify it now?"

Carol laughs. "Maybe."

They walk quietly for a while before Carol ventures a suggestion, trying very hard not to sound judgmental. She knows where she herself has come from, after all. "You might consider learning to protect yourself, so you don't have to rely on a man to do it."

"That's what Garland says. He's been teaching me to shoot better. That's all well and good, but there are more ways to survive than with guns and knives. I haven't made it this long for no reason. I find people easy to manipulate. Most of them, anyway. I thought I was manipulating Garland _at first_ , but he sees through all my bullshit."

Carol chuckles.

"And Garland's a good and honest man. Those kind…they're almost impossible to manipulate."

When they reach the docks, they run into Harold again. This time he's helping to tie the returning _Susan Constant_ to a cleat hitch while the fishermen drag down their nets full of still-flopping fish. He greets them both with a friendly smile. "Hey, Shannon. Hey, Cary."

"Hello, Harold," Carol says.

"That man you came with? Daryl? Is he your husband?"

"We're together," Carol replies.

"He just doesn't seem like your type."

"I might have revised my type in thirty plus years. Especially considering that my type didn't exactly work out for me."

Harold frowns, while Shannon laughs and says, "You set her up for that one, Harold."

Carol wasn't even thinking of Harold, though. She was thinking of Ed.

"I guess I did." He takes a step closer to Shannon. "Tell your husband we've got a special poker game Friday night if he wants in. Government men only. On the _Godspeed_. Buy-in is two ounces of tobacco."

"I'll let him know, but he's busy, Harold. And he's not much for gambling."

"He should _really_ come. All the commissioned officers will be there. The manager, too."

"What's that got to do with anything?" Shannon asks.

Harold glances behind himself as if to make sure no one is listening, and then he looks back. "Garland seems…aloof to a lot of the officers. Like he's not one of the guys. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

"You're saying my husband's a shit schmoozer."

"I wasn't going to put it that way….but…yeah. Him trying to shut down the whorehut, it wasn't exactly popular."

"That place is an STD outbreak waiting to happen," Shannon tells him.

"I know. That's why I never visit it."

"And all along I thought it was your good morals."

Carol observes this exchange silently and curiously.

"It's just not popular," Harold insists, "trying to shut that place down. It's the _only_ outlet _most_ of these men have. And then Garland tried to reduce the finders' fees on scavenged goods so more goes in the common pot."

"So?" Shannon asks. "The community has young and old who can't - "

"- I'm not telling you it's wrong, Shannon," Harold insists. "I'm telling you it's not _popular_ , that Garland's done unpopular things. He testified it was safe to release that spy. And then he called dibs on you."

"Called _dibs_ on me?" Shannon says, her voice rising. "Garland's the _only_ one who _asked_ to marry me. Because none of the rest of y'all wanted to deal with feeding a baby and a mama-in-law."

"I'm just saying he isn't as popular as he _should_ be in his position. He has the loyalty of his posse, but they aren't in the government. He has to start thinking about the loyalty of the navy men. It's politics, Shannon. You of all people know politics."

Shannon sighs. "I _do_ know politics. I just didn't know this had become such an issue."

"He just needs to grease a few palms. Be one of the guys every now and then. I'm trying to _help_. I don't want the rest of the officers persuading the captain to demote Garland one day."

"I get it," Shannon assures him with a sigh. "Garland will be there Friday night. I'll see to it."

Harold nods. "He's _lucky_ he's got a good handler." He raises his hand slightly to Carol. "Good to see you alive, Cary. Hope you win your case."

"Good to see you, too, Harold," Carol replies, and she's not entirely lying. It's nice to know some piece of that old world has survived.

Carol puts a hand on her side as she walks the rest of the way with Shannon to the museum. She's tempted to ask for the wheelchair, but she doesn't. The walk took more out of her than she expected. Maybe the doctor is right. Maybe she _will_ pop a stitch if she tries to ride a horse in the next few days.

Shannon tells the guard in the hallway, "Garland says Carol can have the full range of this corridor – breakroom, infirmary, bathroom, and library. She's going to be walking around on her own. Just not beyond this hall."

"Yes, ma'am," the guard replies.

Shannon takes Carol to the breakroom for lunch. She draws some canned soup out a cabinet and then signs it out on an inventory sheet, opens it, and pours it into a big bowl.

"It's not too long expired?" Carol asks.

"Oh, this is our own stuff we canned last year," Shannon says as she puts the bowl in the microwave. There's a whir as it begins to heat. "Vegetable venison stew."

"You're on the honor system with the inventory?" Carol asks.

"In the breakroom, yes. And in the storehouse. But regular distributions from the pantry are made under the supervision of the manager weekly. And he who does not work does not eat. That's what the _original_ Captain John Smith said, when Jamestown ran into the problem of freeloaders. Here, you earn your rations, the accountant keeps track, and you don't take more than you earn. If you _do_ – if you _steal_ – it's thirty-six hours in a cell with nothing but bread and water. And three strikes and you're out. Meaning, you're banished if you're convicted of stealing three times. People don't steal much."

"And people who can't work?"

"Sponsors. Someone else works for them. Like Garland worked for me when I was laid up with the baby. Like we both work to sponsor Terrence now. That's our little orphan. He stays in the museum, but we hang out with him when we can. All the younger orphans have sponsors. The ones over twelve work for themselves."

"Sounds like a lot of work."

Shannon shrugs. "Basic adult rations are only fifteen hours a week." She looks like she's adding numbers in her head. "For us and Mama and Gary and Terrence, Garland and I have to work seventy hours a week between the two of us. Not even forty apiece. Of course, when I was laid up with the baby those first six weeks, Garland was working all seventy of those hours himself. Then again, his job just about calls for a seventy-hour work week anyway. He's always being called out in the middle of the night."

The microwave beeps and she takes the big bowl out and starts dishing it into smaller bowls. She sets them down with spoons and cups of water, and then sits across the table from Carol. "We can work extra for extra rations, too."

"It's an interesting system," Carol says and blows on the hot soup. "We just expect people to be honest in the Kingdom, work as much as they're able, and work more when there's a need for it."

"And when they don't?"

Carol shrugs. "They get a stern talking to. But mostly they just _do_."

"Why?"

"Patriotism, I suppose. They love the Kingdom. My late husband…he was a good at whipping up that feeling."

Carol's not sure she's as good at it. She's let some of the ceremonial trappings of the Kingdom fall by the wayside. She always thought they were a little silly and impractical, but maybe they were just smart. Maybe Ezekiel knew precisely what he was doing. She didn't marry a dummy after all. After Ed, she swore she'd never marry an unworthy man again.

Ezekiel was one of the best men she's ever known, along with Daryl and Glenn and T-Dog and a handful of others. And he loved her, and he _asked_ …Carol wanted to bury the past, so she married him. But what Daryl said in the courtroom yesterday, about not living in the Kingdom because he couldn't _stand_ to see them together…She didn't know that.

Daryl must have wanted to be with her – _that way_ \- even then. And she didn't know. She _suspected_ , in the prison, but he never made a move, so she thought she'd misread him, that she'd mistaken deep friendship for romantic interest. And then everything happened to them…and they retreated into themselves, and there was this distance. It seemed like an ocean. Sometimes they'd swim near each other again, reach out, touch hands, and then the tide would rip them apart again.

"If the jury _doesn't_ rule for release," Carols asks, "what happens? Do I at least get to be with Daryl here?"

"Well, yes, if they rule to give you cleared foreigner status and probationary admission instead of release. No, if they rule for further investigation."

When they finish their lunch, Carol volunteers to wash the dishes, but Shannon insists on doing it. She tells Carol she has to get back to work in the gardens, and then she deposits her i the library, a former office now filled with wall-to-wall bookcases and three comfy arm chairs. On the floor is a large cardboard box marked "Book Return" and another marked "Check-Out Cards."

"I'll come and get you as soon as the verdict's in," Shannon promises.

Carol settles with her feet up on a hassock and digs into _Little Women_ , but her eyes roam over the same paragraph six times. She can't concentrate. All she can do is worry about the verdict.


	34. Chapter 34

Daryl tries to play solitaire and read the second Raymond Chandler novel Garland left him, but mostly he just jumps at every shadow in the entryway to the jailhouse.

Once it's the bailiff, Earl, bringing him lunch.

Then it's Earl coming to clear his lunch tray away.

Next it's Earl come to take him to the outhouse.

Then it's Earl bringing him dinner.

Next it's Earl clearing his dinner tray.

But every time Daryl asks if the jury has made a decision, Earl says, "Not yet."

Daryl builds a house of cards and knocks it down and rebuilds it again. He plays Pyramid solitaire, Klondike, Canfield, and Baker's Dozen. The sun has begun to set and before long, it's going to get hard to see the numbers on his cards.

A shadow darkens the doorway. It's the sheriff, finally, and Daryl scrambles excitedly to his feet.

"Not yet," Garland says. "And at this rate, probably not until tomorrow morning. But I've come to fetch you. My wife insists you not sleep in a cell again tonight. So you'll be on our living room couch. I guess it wouldn't technically be breaking any rules. You'd be under my guard, and Carol is still in the infirmary."

When they get to Garland's cabin, the sun is fully set, but the windows are all aglow with candles and the main room inside is lit by a fire in the hearth.

Daryl takes his boots off by the door, and leaves them on a mud-mat, because that's what Garland's doing, and then he follows him a few steps inside. The main room of the cabin is one big open area off of which the two bedrooms are situated. There's a couch opposite the fireplace, a deerskin rug on the floor, an arm chair, a rocking chair, and a few small end tables big enough for a book or cup. A kettle whistles on the wood stove in the little kitchen nook, which has a hutch, a two-foot long counter, and a four-person wooden table. Copper pots and pans hang on the wall. Shannon plucks up the kettle and pours the hot water in a little china teapot with the strings of two teabags dangling out of it.

"Where's little Gary?" Garland asks her.

"I _told_ you." She sets the kettle down on a hot pad. "He has that sleepover at Johnny's tonight. You need to listen when I talk."

"I might have a few things on my mind, Shannon."

She begins to dunk the tea bags in the pot up and down. "And Mama still isn't back from her hot date with the manager, so maybe that bedroom's going to be free tonight. Daryl can have her bed."

"I don't think your mother wants a strange man sleeping in her bed."

"Well what my mother doesn't know won't hurt her." Shannon puts the cap on the teapot and draws three teacups from the hutch.

Daryl looks around the cabin and sees a shotgun and three rifles in a gun rack above the mantle, no doubt unloaded because of the climbing toddler. He wonders, out of habit, where they keep the ammo, even though he's not planning on killing anyone or stealing anything. He also wonders where they're keeping his crossbow.

"You don't really think your mother is spending the night there, do you?" Garland asks.

"Well why not?"

"The woman is almost _seventy-five_."

"Older women have urges, too, Garland." Shannon pours the tea in two cups. "Daryl, sugar, you want some tea?"

"Yes, ma'am," he answers. Daryl doesn't know where the ma'am comes from. He certainly heard it often enough growing up in Georgia, but he was never taught to talk that way, not by his crass parents, and when the teachers tried to make him say it, he flat out refused as an act of spite. After a while, the teachers decided it wasn't worth the fight. But right now it just flows out of him. Maybe it's the quaint, homey setting. Maybe it's Shannon's cheerful southern accent, which isn't Virginian. One of the Carolinas, Daryl guesses.

"You want some honey in it?"

"Y'all got honey?" Daryl asks.

"Oh, yeah, we keep bee hives out behind the Indian Village," Shannon tells him. "Little Gary _loves_ to chew on the honeycombs. I'll put a little in your tea."

"Carol a'ight?" Daryl asks as she hands him his cup of tea.

"She ate well," Shannon replies. "And I left her reading in the library. Oh, that reminds me, baby," she turns to Garland, "Harold says there's a poker game Friday night on the _Godspeed_ , and you need to play."

Daryl takes a sip of the tea. His taste buds explode from the honey. It's not as sweet, but it's better than those pixie sticks.

"I'd rather spend that time _relaxing_ at home," Garland replies.

"Well, too, bad," Shannon says, "because I'm not going to be _relaxing_ you. You have to schmooz. Be political. Apparently you aren't popular enough with the officers."

"Upholding the law isn't a popularity contest."

"Unfortunately, Garland," Shannon tells him, "it kind of is. You're going, and you're laughing at all their crude jokes, and you're drinking, and you're going to be one of the boys."

Daryl scans the cabin some more and sees a box of shotgun shells on the top shelf of the bookcase, resting on the 1992 and 1996 _Gun Digests_.

"You know they have a couple of the whores come to those games?" Garland asks. "To serve them drinks. _Topless._ In exchange for a few drinks of their own."

"Well I don't care if you _look,_ Garland, as long as you don't _touch_."

"It's _undignified_."

"Oh, you're going to say _that_?" Shannon asks. Daryl sips his tea and wonders how he can escape being witness to this unraveling argument. "You're going to say _that_ , when I told you I worked in a topless bar to put myself through college? Philosophy degrees don't pay for themselves!"

"That's for damn sure," Garland says.

Daryl snorts. He doesn't mean to, but he does, and then quickly fills his mouth with tea to pretend it was swallowing the tea wrong that made him snort.

Fortunately, Shannon laughs. "That's a good one, baby." She plucks up her tea cup, slaps Garland on the ass, and then walks over to the couch, where she sits down and puts her bare feet up on a hassock and pats the cushion next to her. Garland joins her and invites Daryl to take the arm chair, which he does, uneasily.

Garland sighs and leans back against his wife's shoulder, and she kisses the top of his head. "You're going to win this case," she tells him. "Because you're just that good."

"You're just stroking my ego," Garland replies.

"I am, but your ego's real easy to stroke. You know why?"

"No, why?" Garland asks.

"Because I actually believe eighty-five percent of the compliments I give you."

Garland chuckles.

Daryl slurps his tea down to the lees.

"I've never seen anyone pound tea like that," Garland says.

"Well Daryl just loves my cooking," Shannon says.

"I wouldn't call brewing tea _cooking_ ," Garland tells her.

"It's not like I see you doing a whole lot around this cabin."

"Or I you," he replies. "Your mother does it all."

"You know you're right. We _can't_ let her fall in love with the manager. If she does, she'll move in with him, and we'll have to do it all ourselves."

Daryl feels like he's invading on a domestic scene where he doesn't belong, and he wonders if this is what married life is like, if this is what Carol _wants_ their lives to be like someday – fighting, quickly making up, sitting around the fire, teasing each other, drinking tea. It might not be so bad, he thinks, as long as he could hunt all day first.

Of course Carol doesn't have a fireplace in those chambers in the school. They have electric heat. He'd want a fireplace, he realizes, and a deerskin rug like Garland's. Or better yet - a bearskin rug. And Dog would curl up on it at night and fall asleep while he and Carol made out on the couch.

He'd want a cabin, like this, too…or not like this, exactly, not this wattle-and-daub-type place, but a good, sturdy, old-school _log_ cabin, one he built with his own hands for Carol. And he'd want to hang his crossbow above the mantle, the way Garland's hung his guns.

Hell, who's he kidding? He'd never remember to hang up his crossbow.

But he doesn't want Carol's chambers in the Kingdom, he realizes. He wants _her_ , but he doesn't want _her life_. And she probably doesn't want his life, either, but maybe…maybe they can figure out how to build _their life_ together.

"…Daryl?"

Shannon's repeating some question he missed.

"What?"

"I said goodnight. I have to be in the gardens early tomorrow." She stands, trails her fingers over Garland's shoulders as she walks behind the couch, and says, "'Nite, baby."

"Goodnight, Beautiful." Garland stretches his neck back and looks up at her to accept her goodnight kiss.

The sheriff waits for the bedroom door to click shut to stand and go fish something out from the hutch. He returns with the two glasses and a bottle of Jack Daniels with about two ounces left in the bottom.

"I don't know about you," the sheriff says, "but waiting for this verdict has got me on edge. I need a drink." He sets the two empty glasses on the end table. "I can never sleep the night before a really important verdict."

"Why's it so important to ya?" Daryl knows why it's important to _him_ and Carol, of course, but not why the sheriff cares so very much about their case.

"Because if they release you, it means I've finally earned back the trust I lost when I recommended we let that spy go. And it means we've finally moved on, as a people, from that dreadful night. And if they don't…" Garland sighs and begins to pour, one ounce in each glass.

The bottle, Daryl sees now, is one of the ones he and Carol found in the house in Dumfires. "Looks familiar," Daryl grumbles.

Garland sets the empty bottle down and hands Daryl a glass. "Yes, sorry, it was yours." He picks up the other glass. "Those last two ounces were my share of the finders' fee on the alcohol after it all got divvied up. Well, that and one bottle of wine, but I'm saving that for when Shannon's mad at me." He raises his glass. "Sláinte."

Daryl doesn't know what that word means, but he clicks the sheriff's glass with his own and sips. Damn it's good. What a shame he won't be taking that whole bottle home to the Hilltop. But he'd much rather be taking a living Carol. Daryl's irritated they've been plundered and put on trial just to go home, but he also knows other camps do _far worse_ to strangers on sight. They could have been shot on sight. They could have been tortured. They could have been cooked and eaten. Worst of all, Carol could have been taken and abused for the men's pleasure.

He's glad they've been fed and that Carol's been healed. He wasn't lying when he said he'd have paid it all for her.

Crossbow, too.

And the horses.

Even Dog, if Dog were here.

 _Anything._

It hits him, suddenly, that she's the center of his world.

"Hey," he says. "Them boxes of jewelry ya said y'all have? Could I uh…maybe take a look?"

The sheriff smiles. He throws back the rest of his whiskey. "Let's go pick your girl out an engagement ring."

[*]

By the light of an oil lamp, Garland leads Daryl out of the cabin toward a storehouse. Torches light the corners of the settlement, and a night patrolman roams the perimeter. The lights are on in some cabins, and out in others. Some people are on their porches, drinking moonshine and laughing and talking. A teenage boy and a teenage girl are kissing in the open doorway of the one-room school house.

The storehouse is a long, brick building with wall-to-wall and ceiling-to-floor shelving, as well as shelving down the middle. "Y'all loot the whole county at the start?" Daryl asks.

"The navy men did. Of course, not much is of use anymore." He points to a box marked _D Batteries_. "Half of those don't work, for instance, and you never know until you try one." He draws out a huge cardboard box marked _rings_. "Of course you find uses for things. Like I said, we melt or break jewelry down when we need the metal. We use bits of diamond in grinding wheels. Excellent abrasive." He opens the box and shines the light over it. Diamonds glitter and twinkle. Daryl crouches down and starts digging.

Eventually Daryl admits, "I ain't got no idea what she'd want."

"Well, I don't know Carol, but I'm usually pretty good at reading people. My guess is a simple solitaire."

"Ezekiel gave her a big ass diamond."

"That her first husband?"

"First one treated her right, anyway." Daryl rakes through the pile of rings, overwhelmed by all the choice.

"Well, I wouldn't play copycat if I were you. She's not re-marrying Ezekiel. It needs to make her think of _you_ , not _him_."

Daryl's fingers freeze suddenly. He saw a flash of a ring, with something familiar on its surface, but now it's gone. Where did it go? He digs frantically. "Hold the light closer." Garland does, and Daryl sifts through the rings until he sees it again – a flash of silver, blue, and white. He seizes it and holds it up to the lamp light. "Hell yeah."

"That's a cameo ring. That's not an engagement ring."

"Is now," Daryl says. The ring is a thick band of sterling silver, and the cameo set in its center is made from some blue material – coral, perhaps – and carved out of that blue background, and painted a bright white – is a Cherokee rose.


	35. Chapter 35

Daryl spends most of the night trying – but failing – to sleep on Garland's couch. He finally drifts off only to awake an hour later, in the early morning, to the sound of Shannon's moaning and her cry of "Yes, Garland, baby, yes!"

He drifts off to sleep again, and when he wakes up, it's because he feels a presence by the couch and hears a _click_. Daryl sits up abruptly and reaches instinctively for the knife that's not on his belt. Garland stands snapping a silver revolver into his holster. He's dressed for court, with that weird tie that's not a necktie but a leather cord with a silver eagle.

"Shannon's dropping Carol off at the court on her way to work," Garland says. "The jury won't arrive for a while. We'll be the first ones there. You'll have a moment alone with Carol. I'll keep watch at the chapel door." He looks Daryl over. "But you might want to wash up first. And comb that hair. I've got a decent shirt you can borrow, too."

[*]

Sheriff Garland blocks the chapel door, his back to the pews. Carol is already sitting in the side pew on the stage, ready for court, when Daryl walks down the center aisle, over the dirt floor of the chapel, through the misty haze of multicolored early morning sunlight streaming through the windows.

He mounts the stairs. One step. Two steps. His right hand is buried deep in his pocket, where his fingers nervously turn the cameo ring in circles. He comes to a stop before her and swallows, but he can't make the words form.

Carol smiles. "You look handsome. Did you borrow a shirt?"

"Mhm."

"Your hair's nice. Did you brush it?"

"Mhmh."

"You want to be naughty in church?" she teases.

"Nah." He glances down the aisle to Garland, who still stands with his back to them. He better make this quick. Not just because the captain and jury are coming, but because it'll be less painful that way, like ripping off a bandaid.

 _She might say no._

It's not the first time he's thought of the possibility, but it slaps him now, hard.

 _She might say no._

"You're really nervous about this verdict, aren't you?" Carol asks.

"That ain't it."

"Well, you sure don't look confident they're going to release us."

"I ain't, but I ain't worried 'bout that." He looks into her eyes finally. "Ain't worried 'bout that 'cause yer alive. 'N I'm alive. And we're together, even when we ain't. 'N if we get out today, or next week, or we gotta live and work here for months …don't really matter, as long as we're together. 'S all that matters to me." He breathes out. "I wanna…wondered…" He tries to pull the ring out of his pocket. It snags on the edge, and he yanks it and drops it, and it goes rolling under the pew. "Shit," he mutters.

Daryl gets down on his hands and knees and digs under the pew until he grabs it, wrapping it in the palm of his hand. When he tries to pull back up, his head thuds the bottom of the pew, and he curses. Finally he gets his head out and his torso up. He never planned to get down on one knee-he's not that kind of guy-but now he's down on _two_ , kneeling before her.

He unravels his palm to reveal the ring. "Wanna wear this?" Those aren't the right words, but they're the words that come out.

Carol carefully takes the ring from his palm and turns it over. She gasps when she sees the Cherokee rose in the cameo, and nods. "Yes. Yes. I want to wear it." She slides it on her ring finger. She has to push hard and it doesn't go quite all the way down and now it's jammed on there.

"Ain't gonna come off easy," he says.

"I don't want it to come off," she tells him. "I don't ever want it to come off." She puts her ringed hand tenderly on his cheek, leans down, and kisses him.

"Captain coming!" Garland calls, and Daryl scurries to his feet. He plops down on the pew, and Garland turns and paces down the aisle toward them. He's seated between them before the captain enters.

"Too damn early for work, Gar!" the captain shouts.

"Sure is, Captain. Sure is."

"You coming to the poker game Friday night?" The captain is up on the stage now.

"I don't know. I've been very busy."

"Everyone who's anyone is going to be there. The boys are excited. I've hired bar service, if you know what I mean."

"Mhmhm," Garland murmurs.

"You're not going to let your wife whip you into staying home on a Friday night are you?"

"Jury's coming," Garland says.

The captain retreats to the sacristy until all the jury is seated and then told again to rise, and then he strolls out solemnly, rolls back his chair, takes his seat, and intones, "All may be seated."

Bottoms thud into wooden pews.

Daryl runs the palms of his hands nervously from his thighs down to his knees and back. He's tingling all over, not so much in anticipation of the verdict, but in excitement over Carol's acceptance of the ring. Of course, he forgot to say the whole _Will you marry_ _me?_ part.

 _Shit._

They might not be engaged.

But by the way she was acting, they _might_ be.

"Juror number one," the captain intones, "please rise."

The gray-haired woman in the jury rises.

"Have you reached a verdict?"

"We have, Captain."

"And what is your verdict?"

Carol cluthces her hand and carresses the carving of the Cherokee rose with the tip of her thumb.

The jury woman unfolds a slip of paper that must have been folded six ways, because it takes a long time. Then she says, "Our verdict in the application for release of Carol Stuart and Daryl Dixon is conditional."

"Hell's that mean?" Daryl hisses.

"Listen," Garland replies.

"And what are the conditions for release?" the captain asks.

"That means we _are_ being released?" Carol whispers.

"Listen," Garland repeats.

"The applicants will have their horses and weapons returned to them, and will be released from Jamestown on Sunday morning, at sunrise," the jury woman reads. Daryl's pretty sure it's Tuesday, which means that, counting tonight, they have five more nights here before they can go home. But they're _going_ home. "Provided," the juror continues, "the following conditions are met: One, Daryl Dixon provides six hours of daily labor in exchange for his rations and Carol Stuart's rations for the remainder of their residence at Jamestown. Due to her injury, Carol Stuart will not be expected to work. Two, lodging is provided for the couple at the sheriff's cabin or at his expense, since he applied for their release."

That's good Daryl thinks, it means he'll be out of that cell for good and, more importantly, he and Carol will be together.

"Three, no further evidence arises between now and Sunday morning to indicate that either applicant or their camps is a threat to Jamestown. Four, neither applicant violates any law while in residence at Jamestown. Five, Carol Stuart has had her stitches removed and been given a recommendation of fitness to travel by Dr. Ahmad. Those are our conditions, and that is our verdict, Captain."

Daryl's beginning to feel relieved, but it still remains to be seen if the captain will veto the ruling. At the moment, the big man is looking at his pocket watch. The captain slides it back into his pocket and gestures with his hand. Earl, the bailiff, takes the paper from the juror and brings it to the bench.

The captain reads the paper over, scratches his head, and then reaches to his left to remove a feathered quill pen from an ink well. "Verdict approved," he announces and scrawls his signature across the page. "Sheriff, attend to the details." He slaps the quill back into the inkwell, pushes the paper to the edge of his bench, and picks up his gavel. "This court is adjourned. All jurors are to return to their jobs." He slams the gavel down on the wooden base, rolls back his chair, and hastens from the church.

Carol laughs in relief as the jurors rise, mingle, talk, and begin to disperse from the courtroom. When the Sheriff stands and steps away from his position between them, she slides across the pew and kisses Daryl happily.

"Not bad," Sheriff Garland says when they pull apart. "I know you'd much rather leave this very hour, but Shannon and I will put you up nicely. And it's probably for the best Carol get those stitches professionally removed and not risking them popping out on the road."

"Thank you, Sheriff," Carol tells him. "We're grateful for your support."

"A kindness is never wasted," Garland says. Daryl recognizes those words: the moral from _The Lion and the Mouse_.

[*]

While Shannon takes Carol to get her settled in the cabin, Garland walks with Daryl to the docks to get him started on his work day. "I assume you can efficiently clean and gut a fish?" the sheriff asks.

"Yeah." They walk past a man pushing a cart full of firewood. "Ain't complain'," Daryl says, "just clarifyin', but…. I gotta work six hours a day total? Or six hours a day for _each_ of us?" He doesn't really want to labor for twelve hours a day for five days straight, but of course he will, if that means feeding Carol while she's too sore to work.

"Six hours _total_."

Daryl's relieved, because that also means he'll be able to spend most of the day with Carol. "Any weird laws I oughta know 'bout? So I don't accidentally break one 'n get stuck here?"

"Just the usual. No murder. No theft. No rape. No assault. You'll have free range of the settlement, village, docks, and museum. Just don't go out the front door. And, to be safe, don't go anywhere you don't have a reason to be."

"A'ight."

"So….did Carol say yes?" Garland asks.

"Think so," Daryl mutters.

"You _think_ so?"

"She took the ring."

 **[*]**

Shannon introduces Carol to her mother, Bonnie, a white-haired, seventy-something woman whose green eyes bear a striking resemblance to her daughter's. During the very brief tour of the cabin, Shannon's son Garland, Junior, whom she calls Gary, toddles around after them babbling.

"And this is where you'll be staying," Shannon says as she steps inside a bedroom that has just enough room for a double-sized bed, a long dresser, and a wardrobe. "Gary stays with his grandma."

Carol spies a wash basin and pitcher on the dresser and a stack of clean washcloths and hand towels. The bed is neatly made, and her and Daryl's backpacks are resting on the surface of the blanket, though they look much lighter now, having been emptied, no doubt, of much of their loot.

One of Carol's sheathed knives is lying sideways in front of her pack. She walks over and runs her fingers over the familiar, worn leather. "I thought we weren't getting our weapons back yet?"

"Just the knife." Shannon plucks up Gary, who is trying to climb up onto the bed, and plants him on her hip. "And don't worry, my Mama put fresh, clean sheets on that bed while y'all were in court. Let Daryl know. I think he might have heard me and Garland going at it this morning. He stayed on the couch last night."

"We're not taking your bedroom," Carol says as she snaps her knife to her belt. She assumed they'd be sleeping on the floor in the living room.

"Sure you are. It'll be a lot easier getting in and out of that bed with your stitches than getting up and down from the floor. Besides, I've always wanted to sleep with Garland in front of the fireplace. Now I have an excuse."

Carol smiles. "Well, thank you."

As Shannon leads Carol back into the living room, she glances down at Carol's finger. "That's a pretty ring."

"Wing!" Gary echoes, and Shannon sets him down. He toddles off and climbs up onto the couch.

Carol smiles and caresses her Cherokee rose cameo. "Yes. Daryl gave it to me. I think he meant it as an engagement ring."

Shannon laughs. "You _think_?"

"Well, he's not very good with words."

"It's not your typical engagement ring."

"It means something special to both of us." Sophia's story is not one Carol shares easily with anyone, and she certainly doesn't share it now. She says, simply, "It was the first flower Daryl ever gave me."

"Now _that's_ romantic. Garland could learn a thing or two about wooing from your beau."

Carol snorts. "I can't _wait_ to tell Daryl that." And she won't have to wait long. In six hours, they'll be together, and in five days, they'll be headed home.


	36. Chapter 36

The air reeks of raw fish. A man and a woman descale and gut smallmouth bass on a picnic table in the grassy area alongside the docks. "Michael, Sarah, this is Daryl," Garland tells them. "He'll be working with you today."

The sheriff reaches into the inside pocket of his vest and pulls out a worn, brown leather sheath that Daryl recognizes well. "That one of my knives?"

"You'll need it for work," Garland says.

Daryl takes the sheath, clips it to his belt, and feels instantly better to be armed. When Garland leaves, Michael tosses him a bass, which slides from Daryl's hands when he tries to catch it and slithers into the grass. Sarah laughs.

"Toss the clean ones in that cooler when you're done," Michael says, pointing to a long blue ice chest.

Daryl recovers the fish, lays it on the table, and unsheaths his knife with a twirl.

"Show off," Sarah says with a smile.

"Can you _not_ flirt with the new guy, please?" Michael asks. "I'm standing _right here_."

Daryl makes quick work of the fish, avoids looking at or talking to Sarah, tosses it in the cooler, and then reaches for another. He goes through the same process again two more times.

"Slow down, man," Michael tells him. "If we finish all these, we don't get off work early. We just have to do something else."

Daryl glances up at him. "So?" That just means more work gets done, as far as he's concerned. But he knew plenty of guys like Michael when he was roaming with Merle and working odd jobs. They'd spend a lot of time leaning on shovels, sitting on buckets, taking smoke breaks, bathroom breaks, coffee breaks, and shooting the breeze. Hell, so would Merle.

About fifteen minutes later, Michael says, "Seriously, _slow down_. You're going to make us look bad if we get twice as much done today with only one extra person."

Daryl relents and scales the next fish more gingerly, not that he saves any more flesh that way.

Bootsteps still on the dock not far from their table, and Daryl looks up. Carol's high school sweetheart, Harold Harrison, stands in his blue-and-gray camo Navy working uniform.

"Hello, Commander," Sarah says. "You're looking handsome as always."

"Seriously," Michael mutters. "I'm _right here_."

"Good afternoon, Sarah," Harold replies. "Hello… _Derek_?"

"Daryl," Daryl grunts.

"I guess you and Cary got a verdict of probationary admission?"

"Nah. Got release. Leavin' in a few days."

"Well, I'm happy for you. That's what you wanted. But it would be nice to see Cary's smile around here for longer than that." Harold taps the tip of his camo hat and walks on.

Daryl grunts and slides his knife roughly from the tail to the head of the fish, and the scales flip off. Underneath his breath, to Harold Harrison's retreating back, Daryl mutters, "Her name's _Carol_."

[*]

Shannon has to go to work in the gardens, and Carol feels awkward being left alone in the cabin with Shannon's mother and son. She ends up sitting on the couch and helping Gary to put together a wood puzzle under Grandma Bonnie's suspicious watch. The puzzle sports big pictures of farm animals.

"A cow goes moo," Carol says, and Gary says, "ooooo!"

Eventually, the grandmother takes the boy back to their shared bedroom for his nap, and, to Carol's relief, she must take a nap too, because she doesn't re-emerge. Carol explores the living room and notes the presence of the firearms above the mantle. She scans the spines of the books, which are sometimes stacked vertically to cram more onto the bookcase.

The top two shelves she's pretty sure are Garland's: a series of _Gun Digests_ , missing every other year or so, a bunch of detective novels, _Public Speaking for Dummies_ , a biography of Wyatt Earp and one of Teddy Roosevelt, several Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy novels, and a book containing the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. It's also clear enough that the bottom two shelves are meant to be Gary's books, littered as they are with Dr. Seuss, Roald Dahl, Shel Silverstein, and toddler's board books.

It's the middle two shelves that puzzle her: Plato's _Republic_ next to three Harlequin romance novels; _Gone with the Wind_ wedged between Aristotle's _Nicomachean Ethics_ and Kierkegaard's _Either/Or;_ Immanuel Kant's _Critique of Pure Reason_ beside two erotica novels; the _Tropic of Cancer_ stacked in the middle of _The Analects_ of Confucius andMachiavelli's _The Prince_ ; _Gardening for Dummies_ alongside _A History of Western Philosophy_ ; _How to Win Friends and Influence People_ on top of Descartes's _Meditation on First Philosophy,_ which is on top of _The Joy of Sex_. Are those all Shannon's books?

Carol shakes her head, grabs _Gone with the Wind_ , and settles in the armchair to read. Grandma and Gary emerge an hour later, and the woman leaves to take the boy to play with a friend while Carol continues to read. During that time Dr. Ahmad pays a house call to check her vitals, peek at the stitches, and warn her not to exert herself.

"But I can sew, right?" she asks him.

" _Lightly_ ," he insists.

Carol reads a bit more. Grandma returns and, apparently having decided Carol is not a threat after all, asks her to watch Gary until Shannon gets home so she can go see a friend. Shannon comes in just twenty minutes later, and Garland and Daryl are not long after her.

After watching Garland kiss his wife hello, Daryl awkwardly kisses Carol hello. He smells faintly of fish and strongly of lavender soap. He doesn't kiss her for long, probably because they have an audience.

"Where's your mother?" Garland asks Shannon as he hangs his white Stetson on a hook on the back of the closed front door.

"Dinner with the manager again," she replies. "I think that's getting serious. Though Mamma feels like an adulteress, not knowing if Daddy is dead or alive."

"It's been over seven years."

"Well," Shannon replies, "would _you_ date other women if _I'd_ been missing and presumed dead for seven years?"

"Yes."

Carol catches Daryl eye, and they both resist the urge to laugh and end up smiling.

"Well that's not what I wanted to hear!" Shannon exclaims. "This is your problem, baby! You can't be politic."

Carol insists on helping Shannon to prepare dinner. While they cook, Carol tells her, "The doctor says I can do some light sewing. So if you have anything for me, _please_. I want to _do_ something useful tomorrow."

"Healing from your wound _is_ useful," Shannon tells her. "But there's always plenty of sewing. I'll leave you some."

Little Gary is fed first, with small bites and a sippy cup of cow's milk, and then left to play with his matchbox cars on the deer skin rug. It's a tight fit around the square, wooden table, an intimate and cozy meal of fried catfish, fresh salad with spinach, scallions, and radish, and the ever-present Jamestown cornbread. Garland eyes Daryl as he eats half the meal with his hands, but he doesn't say anything. Eventually, Carol leans over and whispers, "Fork," and Daryl picks it up.

There's strawberry pie for dessert and Carol asks how Shannon makes it.

"I don't. My mamma does, in a dutch oven. She won't give me the recipe, says I'm not _ready_ for it. I keep telling her she better, because she could keel over and die any day now."

"How _politic_ of you, my dear," says Garland, and Daryl chuckles, low, in that rumbling, almost closed-mouth way that Carol loves.

Carol helps with dishes by doing the drying, and then they all move to the living room afterward, where Shannon gives them hot tea. Daryl ends up in the armchair, Carol in the rocking chair, and Garland and Shannon on the couch, while Gary lies face down on the rug, half asleep, slowly rolling a car back and forth.

"How was your day, baby?" Shannon asks.

"Not bad," Garland answers. "I drew up the patrol and watch schedules for the next several days. Found a missing kid. He'd skipped school and gone swimming. And there was a domestic."

"Karen and Don?"

"She smacked him with a frying pan when she found him coming out of the whorehut," Garland replies. "Cast iron."

" _Ouch_ ," Shannon says.

"How was your day?" Garland returns.

"Same old same old. Gardening. The scallions were ready to harvest."

Daryl must be observing all this because when the room falls silent he looks across the way at Carol and asks, "'S yer day?" It makes her smile, this effort at social nicety, which he makes almost like a kid mimicking his parents as they go through the liturgy in church.

"I played with Gary, which was fun," Carol answers. "And I read half of _Gone with the Wind_. How was your day?"

"Stank," Daryl answers. "Cleaned fish."

"It was difficult work?" Shannon asks.

"Nah. Easy. Just _stank_."

"Do you like philosophy, Shannon?" Carol asks, still puzzling over the books.

"Oh, yeah, I got my bachelor's in philosophy. With a minor in political science."

Carol blinks. She looks across the rug at Daryl expecting him to share in her surprise, but he seems unaffected. "Did you know Shannon had a bachelor's in philosophy?"

"Yeah," Daryl says. "Paid for it workin' at a titty bar."

Garland rubs his eyes.

"See, _Daryl_ doesn't judge," Shannon tells her husband.

"I've never _judged_ ," Garland insists. "I just think scholarships would have been preferable."

"Well they don't give scholarships to C students, baby. And don't tell me you've never been to a strip club."

"Only for work."

Gary says, "Vwooom…..vwooom….vw…" and the car he's pushing slows to a stop on the rug as he passes out.

Garland sets his tea cup down on the end table and scoops up the sleeping toddler.

[*]

Dressed in only a pair of sweat pants, Daryl crawls into their borrowed bed with Carol, who, he's happy to find, is wearing only a tank top and panties. She rolls to him, and slow kisses follow. Daryl slips a hand under her shirt and traces her stitches gently with his fingertip. They're thicker than he expected, stronger. She was badly cut. He's not sure how far they can go in her condition. "Ain't sposed to do nothin' vigorous yet, huh?"

"No, but as soon as these stitches come out, and we're on the road…that first night? Sunday night? I want us to have sex."

"Yeah?" he asks, his gruff voice deepening a note.

"I just want it to be special. The first time. Just us. Alone."

"What, no threesomes?"

She smacks his shoulder lightly. "You know what I mean. No one else in the place. And I want to find someplace nice…like the ski lodge was. Or that winery in the mountains. Or…I don't know, a fancy hotel. I've never stayed in a fancy hotel. Maybe a bed and breakfast. We're taking the shorter route back, so I don't know what we'll come across, but just…someplace special."

"A'ight. Find ya someplace special." Five nights from now, Daryl thinks, he's going to be having sex with Carol. He's going to be _inside_ her. The idea has given him a full-on hard on, and when she shifts, her leg brushes it. "Sorry," he mutters.

"Nothing to be sorry for." Carol kisses him and shifts so that his hand lands on her breast. He fondles it gently while she slips her hand into his sweatpants. In that expert way of hers, she quickly relieves his distress.

Daryl pants against the crook of her neck after he cums. Carol makes a soft sound as if she's in pain, and he shifts his weight away. "Ya a'ight?"

"I'm fine. Just a little ache."

"Sorry. Shouldn't of – "

"I'm fine. I guess I jerked too hard." She laughs.

"Ya take them pain pills the doc gave you?"

"I don't want to _rely_ on those. We don't have those in the Kingdom. I don't want to get _soft_."

Daryl sighs.

"We should wash up."

"Ya don't want nothin'?" he asks. "Want me to touch ya?"

"I think I probably shouldn't be swiveling my hips right now. I just want to cuddle, if that's okay."

"Mhmhm." He feels a little guilty that she took care of him and is getting nothing in return, but not so guilty that he isn't _glad_ she took care of him.

They clean up with the washcloths left by the washbasin and crawl back into bed. Daryl rolls onto his back, and she snuggles in, lying on her non-stitched side. Her hand rests on his shoulder, and he can see the shadowed reflection of the cameo on the celling. "Umm…we engaged?" he asks.

Carol raises her head to look at him. "That _was_ a marriage proposal, wasn't it? This morning?"

"Yeah."

"And I did take the ring, didn't I?"

"Yeah."

"So I think that means we're engaged," she says.

"Good."

"I thought maybe we'd have the wedding during the fair at the Kingdom," Carol says as she settles her head back down on his bare shoulder. "A lot of our mutual friends from Alexandria and Hilltop will already be there. Judith would make a cute flower girl, wouldn't she?"

"Weddin'?"

"That's usually what happens when people get married." She peers up at him. "You _did_ want to get married, right?"

"Wanna _be_ married. Don't wanna _get_ married."

"It doesn't have to be big and fancy. And I don't want any other ring than this one. But I'd like some kind of ceremony. Just to mark the start of it, you know? Would that be okay with you?"

Girls like weddings, Daryl supposes. He'd be an ass to deny her one. "Ain't wearin' no monkey suit though."

"Maybe a nice button-down dress shirt?"

"Could do that." He wears button-down shirts all the time anyway. Sturdy work shirts, usually. And sometimes with the sleeves torn off. But a dress shirt can't be too different.

"And maybe a pair of khakis or something?"

Pants are pants. He can wear pants. "Guess that'd be a'ight."

She looks up at him again, with a twinkle in her pretty blue eyes. "And a blazer?"

"Don't push it."

Carol laughs. Daryl reaches over and turns off the oil lamp. Then he toys with the hair at the back of her neck for a while before he asks a question that's been on his mind. "Where we gonna live?"

"Well, I assumed we'd live in the Kingdom. You said you don't hate it. And I _am_ the queen."

"Mhm. Yeah."

"You don't want to live there?"

"'S fine."

She pulls slightly away. "Daryl? It doesn't _sound_ fine."

"Just…don't want live in that damn school. In a marble royal chamber."

"The classroom isn't made of marble."

"Don't like it. Wanna have a cabin or somethin'."

"The Kingdom doesn't have any cabins."

"Yeah," he mutters. "Never mind."

"No. Not never mind. What are you thinking here?"

"Could build one," he suggests. "In the Kingdom. Maybe. Wouldn't be good enough for ya, though, when ya can have lights and water 'n electric heat in the school."

"Daryl, I've lived in a lot of camps. You know I don't have any problem living anywhere."

"Yeah, but why do that when ya ain't got to?"

"Because it's clearly important to you, that's why."

"Just want our own place. Place 's just ours. Wanna…wanna build somethin'. For us."

"Then build something," she says. "For us. We'll find a bit of land somewhere within the gates."

Daryl wraps both arms around her. "A'ight."

"Will you miss the Hilltop too much?"

Daryl travels a lot, but the Hilltop has been his home base for almost three years now. "Make me one of yer trade reps." Ezekiel started the annual trade fair, but after he died, Carol found it insufficient to supply the Kingdom's needs. So she appointed a trade team that travels to Alexandria and then on to the Hilltop and back to the Kingdom on a regular trade schedule to exchange goods. Oceanside was too far away to be put in the loop, though they do come to the annual fair. If Daryl joins the trade team, he'll be able to see Hershel at the Hilltop and Judith in Alexandria on those trips.

"You'd be gone for five full days every four weeks, March through December." They avoid travel in January and February, due to the threat of snowstorms.

"So?"

Carol shrugs. "I'd miss you is all. But I know you'll feel pent-up in the Kingdom if you're there all the time. It's a good compromise. And I know I can rely on you to keep the trade team safe."

"So 'm hired?"

Carol's laugh leaves a cloud of warm breath on his bare shoulder. "Yeah. You're hired."

Daryl closes his eyes, and for the first time in nights, he sleeps soundly.


	37. Chapter 37

On Wednesday, Daryl helps two of the hunters – Barry and Steve - pluck and clean the ducks they shot in the wee hours of the morning, while he was still sleeping with Carol in his arms. They do the work at the butcher's table in the settlement, and Daryl listens to their banter. They talk about hunting, about their weekend plans, and about Barry's teenage daughter's boyfriend. "I always make sure I'm cleaning my guns when he comes to pick her up for their dates," Barry says.

Daryl smirks to himself and thinks that's what he'd do, if he had a teenage daughter.

"Where does he take her?" Steve asks.

"Picnics," Barry says. "Rowing on the river. The movies."

"Movies?" Daryl grunts.

"They show them in the theater in the museum on Saturdays and Sundays at noon and seven," Steve answers. "You have to sign up ahead of time if you want to go. Limited seating. A ticket costs an ounce of tobacco, an ounce of moonshine, or a can of soup. What are they showing this weekend?"

" _The Little Mermaid_ in the morning and _Ghost_ in the evening," Barry answers.

"Seriously?" Steve asks. "Just a kids' movie and a chick flick? Nothing for the men?"

"Well, I wouldn't say that. Pretty sure my wife's going to be horny after seeing Patrick Swayze shirtless in that pottery scene."

Daryl has no idea what they're talking about. He's never seen a chick flick in his life, and the only thing he knows Patrick Swayze from is _Red Dawn_ , which he saw in his early teens, after sneaking into the movie theater through the exit door his cousin, an usher there, left propped open for him. For the next month, he fantasized about resisting an occupation with guerilla warfare and all the girls who would finally fall all over him when he did.

Hank, from the sheriff's posse, the one who signaled with the flag, walks by the table where they're plucking. A rifle dangles from his shoulder. "Good job, boys!" he says.

"You going to that party in the Indian Village Friday night?" Steve asks him.

"No can do," Hank replies. "I volunteered for night patrol by the docks."

"Now _why_ would you volunteer for _night patrol_ on _party night_?" Steve asks him.

"Because there's gonna be an officers' poker game onboard the _Godspeed_. Which means they're gonna have a couple topless ladies up there on deck serving drinks. Well within my _purview_."

"That's not how you use that word," Barry says, and Steve chuckles.

Hank walks on. Daryl's on his last duck when Garland comes to get him, saying, "I need your help with something."

They end up fixing a few broken slats in the settlement fence together. With a nail dangling from his mouth, Daryl asks, "How'd the sheriff get stuck doin' this?"

"Wednesday's technically my day off, unless there's an emergency, but I'm working for my orphan's rations. Next we shovel shit."

"Hope that's a metaphor," Daryl replies after he pounds in another nail.

It's not.

When they're mucking out the stables together, Garland asks, "What did you do? In the old world?"

It doesn't bother Daryl anymore, that question. It doesn't make him feel ashamed. He knows status is determined differently now, that the question is an idle one, and the answer will have no effect whatsoever on his ranking in this world. "Same sort of shit 'm doin' here. Odd jobs. Just gettin' by."

"Before I was a cop, and then a homicide detective, I used to do roofing. In the summer. In Virginia. In the afternoon."

Daryl chuffs. "That must of sucked worse than shovelin' shit."

"What's the worse job you ever had?"

"Once, m'brother, Merle, got us this two-day job, cleanin' out some hoarder's house." Daryl dumps a shovel of horseshit in the fertilizer pile and then follows Garland back into the stable for more. "I thought _we_ grew up in a trash pile, but _this_ place… _damn_. Floor-to-ceiling newspapers and magazines, wall-to-wall soda cans and bottles, an entire clothes closet where this old lady'd been storing her Depends for months."

"The adults diapers?" Garland asks.

"Yeah. Her _used_ Depends."

"Jesus. Did you wear hazmat suits?"

"Should of. Just wore gloves 'n paper masks. We found three dead kittens, too."

"Afternoon, sheriff," says a curly haired woman who strolls inside holding a brown leather doctor's bag and wearing knee-high boots.

"Afternoon, Carolyn. Carolyn, this is Daryl. Daryl, this is our veterinarian."

Daryl nods a greeting.

"Dead kittens?" she asks. "In one of the barns?"

"Ah, nah. 'S long time ago. Just tellin' a story."

"Oh, good," she sighs. "I was afraid Sphinix's new litter had gotten sick. Are you the one the convict stabbed?"

"Nah," Daryl replies. "He stabbed m'…m' fiancé." Because that's what Carol is. His fiancé. She's going to be his _wife_. He's going to be a married man. The idea still stuns him a little every time he's reminded of it.

"Ah. Details often get lost in the grapevine." Carolyn sets her bag down and pulls out a stethoscope.

They finish shoveling the shit and then go to split wood. "Were you married in the old world?" Garland asks as they work.

Daryl's surprised by the question. Does he seem like the marrying kind? Of course, Garland knows he _is_ getting married. So maybe he does. "Nah. 'S just me 'n my brother."

"I had a little sister. I got her out of Richmond when it was overrun by cannibals. We settled for a few months in a camp with about twenty other people. A buddy and I went out scavenging one day, came back three days later, and found the whole place transformed. No idea what happened. I had to put my own sister down." Wood cracks beneath Garland's axe.

"Had to put m'brother down, too," Daryl tells him, and brings the axe down hard on the wood. It splinters in two. He hasn't mentioned that in years. It's a strange relief, to be able to just _say_ it right out like that.

"I suppose we should talk of more cheerful things. When's the wedding?"

"Few weeks after we get back." They should reach the Kingdom by the end of April, and the fair is at the end of May. Daryl supposes he'll see Carol safely to the Kingdom and then return to the Hilltop to hunt as much as he can for three weeks and fill the smokehouse as a parting gift. Then he'll take Dog and what few possessions he has and move to his new world. They'll be married at the fair, and he'll start building that cabin. It should be finished by August. The sense of purpose this thought gives him is foreign, but strangely exhilarating at the same time. He's going to be a husband, Daryl realizes once again.

Daryl Dixon. A _married man_.

Merle would laugh his ass off.

[*]

That evening, they have duck for dinner, which is a welcome change from the usual fish. In the evening, after Grandma and Gary have gone to bed, he sits in the arm chair, listening to Carol and Shannon and Garland talk and sometimes making a gruff comment or two himself. He's grown to like Garland and thinks he might actually miss having the man around when they're gone.

That night, Daryl makes out with Carol in bed, but it doesn't go very far. She's worn out from all the sewing she did for the orphans today, more than she should have, no doubt, and so she's taken that pain pill she swore she wouldn't, and she fades to sleep mid-kiss.

Daryl sighs, kisses her forehead, and turns off the oil lamp. "Settle down," he orders his hard-on, and, eventually, it does.

[*]

On Thursday, Carol volunteers to help Shannon in the gardens. "Oh, no, not with those stitches still in," Shannon tells her. "Weeding and digging and planting…it's _exhausting_. Not to mention all the movement."

"I'm bored. Can't I at least water with a watering can or something?"

"Well, I _could_ work in the greenhouse today. You could sprinkle a little fertilizer. I'll get you some garden gloves."

Shannon leads her to a part of the settlement she hasn't seen, beyond the triangular fence. "Hello, Rodrigo!" Shannon calls and waves to a man with salt-and-pepper hair who is standing by the pig pen and taking notes on a clipboard while talking to another man who is throwing slop.

He turns around and Carol sees by the crow's feet around his eyes that he's probably close to seventy. "Morning, Shannon," he replies and goes back to his notes.

"That's the manager," Shannon whispers. "My mama's new beau."

Once in the greenhouse, they chat while they work. Shannon asks, "So when's the wedding?"

"In May. During our spring fair."

"So I take it you two have sealed the deal?"

"Yes, we're officially engaged," Carol answers as she pushes the fertilizer into the soil.

"No, I mean… I presume you've started doing a bit of the crumpet."

Carol laughs. "A bit of the _what_?"

"A bit of _How's Your Father_? Boppin' squiddles. Dancing in the sheets." Carol forgot she told Shannon they hadn't had sex yet, but she laughs more with each euphemism. "A little churning butter. A little bedroom rodeo. Dipping the wick. Dancing the _forbidden polka_."

Carol puts a hand on her side.

"Oh, sorry!" Shannon apologizes. "I forgot laughing hard can cause an ache."

Carol regains control of herself. "It's okay. I have to be able to _laugh_."

"So?"

"Not yet," Carol says, sprinkling a little fertilizer in another pot. "Not while we're guests."

"Oh, honey, what do you think I made sure you had a bedroom for?"

"I just want it to happen on the road. The two of us, solo travelers. All the time in the world. And I want the stitches out so we can…you know… _really_ knock those boots clean."

Shannon laughs.

[*]

Daryl looks physically exhausted when he comes in the cabin that evening, and his hair is wet. When he leans in to kiss Carol, he smells of baby shampoo.

"Did you take a shower?" Carol asks.

"Yeah. Dug irrigation all damn day in what must've been the hottest damn spot in the camp. Garland said I could have one. Down at the museum." He nods to Shannon, who is busy in the kitchen. "Also said he ain't gonna be home for super. Got a business meeting with the manager."

"Well that explains why you're home, Mama," Shannon says. "Instead of _agreeing on stuff_ with the manager."

Grandma Bonnie appears befuddled by the remark but Carol hides a snort behind her hand.

After dinner, when Grandma and Gary are in bed, and Daryl, Carol, and Shannon are enjoying tea in the living room, Daryl asks, "'S yer day?"

Carol smiles. Maybe by the time they leave Jamestown Garland will have trained him in all sort of little nuptial niceties. "Shannon and I did a little gardening. I nearly popped a stitch laughing."

Shannon says, "You look tired Daryl, sugar. You and Carol should go right to bed when you finish that tea." She gives Carol a little wink.

But when they do get to bed, and Carol slides up to him, lying on her uninjured side, and presses her lips tenderly to his forehead, Daryl's already half asleep. When she kisses his nose, he's three-quarters of the way there, and when she kisses his lips, he's all the way out.

[*]

On Friday, Daryl helps prepare a deer hide for tanning and gets to know two more hunters. He delivers firewood to the Indian Village, and patches a hole in the roof of one of the huts.

In the evening, he's plopped in the arm chair, silently watching Carol as she sits in the rocking chair and hems a pair of pants for one of the orphans. He thinks she's beautiful when she's concentrating on her sewing. There's a calm look in her eyes, and sometimes she sticks her tongue out ever-so-slightly when she's trying to get the stitch just right. He wants to suck that tongue.

She looks up at him and smiles. "Penny for your thoughts?" she asks.

"Ain't got no thoughts."

Garland tucks in Gary while Shannon puts away the washed and dried dinner dishes in the hutch.

"I think I'm going to bed, too," Shannon's mother Bonnie says as she folds the drying towel and sets it on the counter. "It's been a long day."

"What, no hot date tonight with the manager tonight, Mama?" Shannon asks.

"He has that poker game." She disappears into the room she shares with the little boy. Garland comes out and shuts the door behind him.

"Mama just reminded me, Garland," Shannon says, "you've got that poker game tonight."

"I don't want to go to that damn game," he mutters.

"All the movers and shakers will be there, baby. Movers and shakers. You really need to put in an appearance. Pretend to relate to the hoi poi. I told you what Harold said."

Garland sighs. "Those games are so _vulgar_."

"Well, sometimes you have to be a politician, Garland, whether you want to be or not." She draws out a bottle of wine and puts in on the table in the kitchen nook.

"Why are you taking out the wine?"

"Because if you get to go to a poker game and look at half naked women, then I get to split this bottle of wine and play cards with Daryl and Carol."

Carol looks up from her sewing and catches Daryl's eye. "Half naked women?" she asks. Daryl looks down at the dirt beneath his fingernails.

"A couple of the prostitutes are going to be serving drinks topless," Shannon explains. "No touching allowed though. At least not for Garland. But if _he_ gets to see them, _I_ get wine."

" _Gets_ to see them?" Garland exclaims. " _You're_ the one who's making me go! And that wine was supposed to be for a special occasion."

"Having guests _is_ a special occasion. And if you recall, it's actually _their_ wine. You'll get your share of moonshine and Jamestown brew at the game, I'm sure." She sashays up to him, kisses his frowning lips, and says, "Have fun, baby."

Garland sighs loudly, plucks his white Stetson from the hook on the door, and sets it on his head. "You're to blame if I come home horny."

"Just bring it home to me, baby. Always to me."

"Only you," he agrees and kisses her cheek before heading out the door.

"Poker or rummy, kids?" Shannon asks as she pops the cork from the wine bottle.

"I ain't playin'," Daryl mutters. "Got a knife needs sharpenin'." Really, he just doesn't want to have to socialize, and Shannon asks a lot of questions.

"Spoil sport," Carol tells him, and puts down her sewing to walk over to the kitchen nook. She pauses to kiss Daryl on the top of his head. "I'm game for anything," she tells Shannon as she sits down at the table. " _Especially_ the wine. Deal me in."


	38. Chapter 38

While Carol and Shannon drink and laugh and play cards at the table in the kitchen nook, Daryl sits in the armchair running a sharpening stone back and forth over the edge of his knife. Daryl's never heard Carol _laugh_ like that with another woman in the Kingdom. He's seen her smile at something Nabila said once or twice, or talk seriously with Dianne about Kingdom business, but Daryl wonders suddenly if she has a single _real_ female friend in the Kingdom. He wonders if, as their ruler, she can ever let herself get close to them.

"Rummy!" Carol shouts and slaps a card on the table with a loud - _whap_.

"Well you don't have to smack it like you do Daryl's ass in bed," Shannon tells her.

Carol splutter-laughs. She turns and glances at Daryl, who lowers his head and concentrates fiercely on his blade.

"Oh, I'm sorry, did I make your beau blush?" Shannon asks.

"It doesn't take much to make him blush," Carol replies and plucks up her wine glass.

The door to Gary's bedroom creeks open and Bonnie comes out holding her grandson on her hip. "Shannon, Gary's got another one of those monster headaches. Do you have any more of the doctors' special remedy?"

"Oh, damnit, I'm clean out. I'm going to have to go all the way down to the infirmary in the museum and get some. Unless," she tells Carol, "your beau would be a doll and go get it for me."

Carol cocks her head and bats her eyelashes in Daryl's direction. "Would my beau be a doll?" She laughs at Daryl's pained expression. "Please, Pookie?"

Daryl flushes at her use of that nickname she's never said in front of _anyone_ before, stands, and sheathes his knife. "Yeah. Go get it."

"Oh, good," Bonnie says. "What a gentleman." After lowering Gary for Shannon to kiss his little forehead, Bonnie returns to the bedroom with the boy.

"Is the infirmary gonna be open?" Daryl asks as he shrugs into his leather vest.

"There's always _someone_ on duty," Shannon tells him. "Just tell them I need a refill on Gary's headache medicine. They'll know."

"Gotta pay for it or somethin'?"

"They'll mark it down and we'll sort it out."

When Daryl opens the front door, Carol says, "No looking at the half-naked women on your way past the docks."

"Pffft." He shuts the door behind himself, but he can still hear the women laughing inside.

As he walks through the settlement, Daryl waves to Earl, who is patrolling the inside of the fence. The old fort is largely deserted tonight, because of some loud party going on in the Indian Village on the other side of it. There's live music – guitar, fiddle, mouth harp, and washboard, and lots of people – of all ages, it seems - laughing.

For all its strange customs, and its crass captain, Jamestown isn't a bad place, Daryl thinks. The Hilltop is known for its farming, Oceanside for its fishing, the Kingdom for its music and movies and gardens, Alexandria for its extra-fortified fences – but Jamestown has it _all_. The people are a mixed bag, like people anywhere. He likes Garland and Shannon, though. He likes Earl the baliff-patrolman, Dr. Ahmad, and that veterinarian, Carolyn. He likes the hunters and the irrigation diggers he's met. He likes the manager, Rodrigo, who brought him water while he was working on Thursday. He doesn't know if he likes Grandma Bonnie yet, but he sure does like her strawberry pie.

The music fades into the distance as Daryl walks in the dark, relying on starlight and moonlight, out of the settlement, past the empty farm fields, until he finally reaches the wooden planks of the docks. Beyond the _Discovery_ and the _Susan Constant_ , he can hear the game going on aboard the _Godspeed._ There's laughter and the occasional bark of manly shouting and women laughing.

As he gets closer, by the lights of all the lanterns on the deck of the ship, he can see a bare-breasted woman walking about pouring beer from the Jamestown brewery. A second topless whore sits on the captain's lap. Daryl can only make out the sheriff by his white Stetson. Garland's pulled it down over his eyes and is concentrating on his cards.

Carol's high school sweetheart, Commander Harold Harrison, appears to be watching rather than playing the game. He stands looking over the manager's shoulder at his cards. The lieutenant commander also stands watching, while three more naval officers sit around the table playing.

Four sailors, clearly not invited to the festivities reserved only for the officers and high-ranking government officials, linger on the dock, stealing glances up at the women, and not observing Daryl's presence. The night patrolman for this section of Jamestown – Hank - is walking down the dock straight in Daryl's direction, but doesn't seem to see him either, masked as Daryl is in the dark shadow of the _Susan Constant_. Hank stops, turns, and looks up at the serving woman who has now leaned over the deck to shake her tits at him.

Daryl's wondering why she's giving Hank a free show when the sailors suddenly surround the patrolman. Two pin his arms, one covers his mouth, and the fourth slits his throat with a knife. It all happens so fast that Daryl can't shout a warning to the sheriff.

While the sailors are murdering Hank, the whore sitting on the captain's lap drives a knife up and into his throat, and the commander – _Harold_ _Harrison_ himself - slits the throat of the manager. The lieutenant commander is coming in to slit Garland's throat when the stabbed captain rears up with the knife still lodged in his neck and topples both the whore and the poker table. Two officers jump the captain at once, but he throws them off like rag dolls.

In the commotion, the sheriff evades the lieutenant commander's blade and yanks free his revolver, but then has it knocked from his hand by the lieutenant, who lunges for it when it falls to the deck. While the lieutenant scrambles to pick it up, the sheriff leaps overboard, vanishing with a splash into the depths of the water.

Before he can be noticed, Daryl buries himself stomach down in the tall grass alongside the dock and unsheaths his knife. He army crawls toward the _Godspeed_ and then all the way up to the edge of the grass to peer through the blades. The moonlight illuminates the sheriff's white Stetson, which floats on the black, rippling surface of the river.

A coup is unraveling right before his eyes, and there are nine armed men – five on the ship, four on the docks – and perhaps as many as two armed women, if both of those whores have weapons. The men are probably avoiding gunshots, though, so as not to alert the patrolman in the settlement, the patrolman in the Indian Village, or the guards who stand by the iron gate outside the museum.

The officers, as a group, have finally managed to bring the captain down. Just to make sure he's good and dead, Daryl supposes, all five of them, together, heave his mighty, bleeding body into the river where it sends up a waterfall of splashing water.

That means the sheriff is the only man left alive in the line of secession standing between Harold Harrison and the leadership of Jamestown.

Daryl, knife in hand, stomach down, slithers further to the left to get a better look and to await his moment. He figures out where the sheriff has gone, even if the navy men haven't, because he sees him surface just a moment for a breath of air before diving down again in the direction of the wooden docks. Daryl assumes Garland will swim there, surface beneath the wood, hidden by the planks, and tilt his head back, nose just above the water, to breathe the six inches of air between the river and the dock.

"Where the hell did Garland go?" Harold yells at the lieutenant commander. "How could you lose him!"

"How could you trust a whore to be able to kill the captain!" the lieutenant commander shouts back.

Harold leans over the deck of the boat and calls down to the sailors below. "Find him!"

They scurry along the docks, searching the water, as the officers disembark from the ship. They all have guns on their hips, but Daryl's still pretty sure they don't want to use them, not when it could bring men loyal to the sheriff running. Their voices won't travel all the way to the museum or the settlement, but a gunshot surely will.

The two whores on the ship have pulled on their shirts and are throwing back moonshine from mason jars – whichever ones didn't break in the tumult.

"Garland!" Harold calls as he paces along the dock. "If you don't come out here _right now_ , I'm going back to your cabin, and I'm going to fuck that full-time whore you call your wife!"

Harold waits silently, but the sheriff does not emerge. Of course he doesn't. He damn well knows he'll be murdered the second he does, and he'll certainly have no chance of protecting his wife then. Daryl would await his moment too. He _is_ awaiting his moment.

"Don't believe me?" Harold yells. "Fine. I'll go get Shannon now." Harold begins strutting toward the field and stops right in front of where Daryl is hiding. Daryl wills every muscle in his body to still. He almost stops breathing. "I'll drag her back here," Harold calls, "and you can listen to her satisfied screams."

"You're doing what?" the lieutenant commander asks nervously as he stops searching the water and strides over to Harold. "Are you insane? That will draw attention!"

Harold lowers his voice to a near whisper, and Daryl can just barely make out his words. "By now the kid and the mother-in-law will both be asleep. No one will ever know I was there. Almost everyone is at the party in the Indian Village. I'll wait until Earl's patrolling the far side of the settlement, and then I'll bring Shannon here on some trumped-up excuse. I'll make sure no one sees me." Harold has completely forgotten, or perhaps was never told, that Daryl and Carol are staying in that cabin, too.

Daryl seriously considers jumping Harold right here and now, but he knows Carol will handle the bastard if he tries to hurt her or Shannon. She _does_ have a knife now, after all, and he doesn't want to give away his position, not yet, not when it's nine against one. They'll just kill him.

"Once we have her down here," Harold tells the lieutenant-commander, "we scare her good. When Garland hears her crying, I guarantee you he'll come out. Then we kill him, kill her. We blame the mutiny on Garland, Shannon, and Hank. We tell the people they plotted it all so Garland could rise to the top. _They_ killed the manager. Stabbed the captain. In the fight to protect the captain, we killed them all. But unfortunately, the captain fell overboard in the tumult, and he was stabbed so badly…he drowned."

"That's good thinking," the lieutenant commander replies. "This is why _you_ should have _always_ been captain."

"Keep looking for Garland while I'm gone. Break up. Scour the docks. Search the other ships, in case he managed to climb up in one of those. Take a rowboat out on the river. See if you can find out where he swam to."

Harold's footsteps clatter across the wooden dock and disappear on the dirt path beside the fields.


	39. Chapter 39

When Harold's gone, it's eight against one, but Daryl still waits.

When the lieutenant commander and the lieutenant set out on the river in a rowboat with a glowing lantern on the bow to search the water for Garland, it's six against one, but Daryl still waits.

When two more men disappear onto the _Susan Constant_ to search the ship, it's four against one, but Daryl still waits.

When another two men board the _Discovery_ , it's two against one, but Daryl still waits.

But when the slain Hank reanimates, because they slit his throat instead of stabbing him in the head, and the walker begins lurching its way toward the two searchers on the dock, and the men turn and walk with knives drawn toward the growling creature – _then_ Daryl makes his move.

[*]

Shannon shuts the door to her mother and Gary's bedroom and rejoins Carol at the table. "Poor little guy," she says. "He cried himself to sleep. Mama's asleep too."

"He's a cute little one," Carol says as she deals another hand.

Shannon refills their empty wine glasses. "He's going to ask one day why he's a different color than both of us. I haven't decided what to tell him yet."

"Just tell him the truth," Carol says.

"That his biological father was killed trying to invade what he thinks of as his _home town_?"

"Well, maybe a selected _version_ of the truth."

There's a knock at the door. Shannon lays her hand of cards facedown on the table. "Daryl should know he doesn't have to _knock_." She stands up and walks to the door.

Carol arranges her hand by suit and number.

"Harold!" Shannon says in surprise. "Why aren't you at the poker game with Garland?"

 **[*]**

Daryl charges down the dock as the two men draw their knives on the walker. They both turn at his footsteps, which gives the walker a chance to sink its teeth into the neck of one of them. The bitten man drops his knife to the dock and screams, and so the other man whirls around and raises his knife to drive it into the walker's head, but before he can, Daryl quickly slits his throat, scoops up the first man's fallen knife, and then promptly buries himself in the grass again.

He lies there, a knife in _each_ hand now, as the walker begins to feast.

The four men who boarded the two ships come clamoring out and jump onto the docks at the sound of the screaming. Daryl lays low as the navy men's boots pound down the dock toward the scene. One of them kills the feasting walker. A second kills the bitten man, murmuring, "Jesus Christ." A third says, "Why did you leave him to change!"

"We got distracted by the sheriff jumping!" replies the fourth.

One of them crouches down to look at the other fallen sailor. "Arnie wasn't bit! His _neck's_ been _slit_!" He stands and turns in a circle. "And where's his knife?"

[*]

"Can I come in for a minute?" Harold asks.

Shannon steps back to let him in, saying, "Oh no! Did something happen to Garland?"

"Hey, Cary," Harold says, sounding surprised and…more than surprised. Thrown off? There's something in his voice Carol doesn't like, something that sets every hair on the back of her neck on edge. "I didn't realize you were staying here." Harold shuts the door behind himself.

Carol has her back to the door, but she can hear the _click_ of the lock. Why would he _lock_ it? She slowly lowers her cards to the table. Smiling, Carol turns in her chair in such a way that he can't easily see when she lets her hand fall to the hilt of her knife. "Garland and Shannon have so kindly put us up until our release."

Harold glances at both the bedroom doors. "Is your boyfriend here?"

"He's just – " Carol's about to lie and say he's just in one of the bedrooms, but Shannon simultaneously says, "Daryl went to get Gary some medicine."

"So it's just you two then?" Harold asks. "And Gary's asleep? And your mother, too?"

From the changed look on her face, Shannon has also begun to suspect something is awry. In fact, it seems like a lot of puzzle pieces are clicking together in her mind all at once. "Good Lord, Harold," Shannon says coquettishly. "With a series of questions like that, I'd think you wanted to _seduce_ us. Not that I'd mind." She laughs and starts walking away from him. "I'm just going to stoke the fire." Shannon walks over to the hearth, but she doesn't stoke the fire. Instead, she reaches for one of the rifles hung above the mantle.

Harold sees. He drops his hand to his knife, unsnaps the sheath, and follows. At the same time, Carol stands. Harold hears the sound of her knife rasping from its sheath, turns, and kicks Carol back. His booted heel hits her where her stab wound was and sends an agonizing pain up her side. Carol stumbles back against the table.

With no time to load the rifle she grabs, Shannon simply slams it across Harold's back as he comes in for Carol with his knife.

He cries out, whirls on Shannon, and rips the rifle from her hands, which is when Carol lunges forward and drives the tip of her knife into the back of his neck. That's as high as she can reach on his tall frame, and the most vulnerable spot she can find from behind.

Harold tears away before she can rip the knife back out. Blood seeps out from around the blade and dribbles down beneath his white shirt collar.

The bedroom door flies open, and Bonnie stands there in her flowing, ankle-length nightgown.

"Mama! Get back in the bedroom!" Shannon yells. "Lock the door!"

Bonnie obeys instantly, and the cabin frame rattles as she slams the door. They can hear furniture sliding across the floor and Gary crying.

Harold, with nothing left to lose at this point, tosses the unloaded rifle across the room, far away from Shannon, and lunges at Carol with his knife. She side steps him. "You bitch!" he yells. "You tease!"

Shannon strikes him again, this time with the unloaded shotgun she grabs from above the mantle, and when he turns on her, Carol yanks her knife out of the back of his neck. Blood splatters her hands and the cabin floor. Harold screams. Gripping the back of his neck, as if that could stop the bleeding, he whirls around, and Carol thrusts the knife straight into his gut, all the way to the hilt. She twists - left, right, left, right - so the gutting hooks can cause the most damage possible before ripping the knife across his stomach, wrenching it out, and stumbling back. Clutching at his cut-open stomach and gurgling on the blood that is now rising to his mouth, Harold tumbles to the ground.

The front door rattles in its frame. "Shannon?" comes Earl's voice through the door. "I heard screaming! What's going on? Open up!"

Shannon unlocks the door and Earl comes bursting in, rifle ready, and surveys the scene. He looks at the bloody knife in Carol's hands and at Harold bleeding on the floor. The bailiff-patrolman raises his rifle directly at Carol. "Drop it!"

[*]

While one navy man is still crouching, and the other three are looking around frantically for who slit the fallen man's throat, Daryl emerges from the grass, rushes forward, and thrusts his arms out wide to plunge a blade in two men's chests at once. He rips upward, and then tears the knives free. The bodies _thud thud_ against the dock.

He kicks back the junior lieutenant, who's running right for him. The junior lieutenant stumbles back a few steps and steadies himself at the edge of the dock, without toppling off. The fourth man has by now stood from his crouching position over the dead body of his fallen peer. He lunges for Daryl, who blocks his blade with one of his own and then swings his other knife up to slit diagonally across the man's throat. When the sailor staggers, clutching his bleeding throat, to the ground, Daryl whirls back to face the junior lieutenant at the edge of the dock.

The junior lieutenant, desperate now only to live and no longer caring about drawing attention, has dropped his knife and drawn his handgun. The man's finger is already dropping toward the trigger.

[*]

Carol immediately opens her hand. The knife clatters to the floor.

"No!" Shannon yells, and pushes the barrel of Earl's rifle down. "Harold attacked _us_!"

"But…why?" Earl says.

"The poker game!" Shannon exclaims. "Harold _wanted_ Garland there. He _told_ me to _make_ him come. _All_ of the government is there! It must be a coup gone bad. Why Harold was coming for _me_ , I don't know. But it must be a coup gone bad."

"MUTINY!" Earl yells, running out the cabin door. "All deputies to the docks!"

[*]

Daryl's certain he's a dead man. All he has is a knife in each hand and a knife can't stop a bullet. But as the junior lieutenant fires, his arm jerks upward, and the shot misses its mark, flying over Daryl's left shoulder. It's a moment before Daryl realizes why. There's a hand on the junior lieutenant's ankle, yanking him.

The junior lieutenant pinwheels backward into the river, and the handgun falls with him.

The sheriff must have come out of hiding and seen what was happening. He swam up the river a ways while Daryl was fighting, and now he's pulled the junior lieutenant in.

They tussle in the water, fighting for the handgun and attempting to drown each other. Daryl scurries to the edge of the dock, sheathes one knife, and tries to get a handle on the scene, to judge when and how to help, but it's hard to make out anything on the black surface of the water. He can't even tell who's who at first.

There's a lot of gasping and sputtering for breath. The junior lieutenant gains hold of the handgun, but can't get it to fire wet, and Garland rips it from his hand and smacks him across the head with it, hard, first to the left, and then again to the right. As the lieutenant passes out and disappears below the water, Garland, unable to tread water exhausted and one handed, also sinks, but soon drops the gun and splutters to the surface.

Kneeling at the edge of the dock, Daryl reaches out for Garland, who seizes his hand. Daryl drags him up onto the dock. The sheriff rolls onto his back, gasping for breath.

By now, the junior lieutenant has resurfaced, bent and floating face down on the river. If he's not dead already, he soon will be.

In the distance, Daryl can make out the row boat rowing quickly toward them. They've been spotted, and the last two officers are coming for them, with guns on their hips, and Daryl has only knives.

But when armed deputies thunder on horseback past the farm fields and toward the ships, the rowers quickly reverse course and row away.

Five men, among them Earl, rear their horses to a stop and clamor, rifles drawn to the dock. Three of them train their rifles on Daryl.

"Not him!" Earl yells. "It was the navy men." They lower their guns.

"Carol?" Daryl asks at the same time Garland gasps, "Shannon?"

"They're both alive," Earl answers. "Harold's dead. Carol killed him. Bonnie's alive. Gary's alive." He takes an oil lamp from one of the other deputies and raises it to peer down the docks. "Wasn't Hank on patrol?"

"Hank's dead," Daryl says. "Sailors slit his throat."

Garland points weakly to the boat rowing away. "Arrest them," he chokes out between gulps for air. " _Alive_. And the two whores hiding on the _Godspeed_."

Three of the sheriff's deputies get in a rowboat while Earl and a second deputy head toward the _Godspeed._ As two of the deputies row toward the escaping officers, the third trains his rifle on them and orders them to drop their weapons and stop rowing.

Daryl sits down beside Garland, helps him into a sitting position, and lets him lean propped up against his shoulder while the man finishes catching his breath. "Thank you," Garland manages finally.

"Well," murmurs Daryl. "Someone once told me - a kindness ain't never wasted."

Garland laughs, coughs, and then says, "That was one hell of a net to chew through."


	40. Chapter 40

Daryl finishes telling Garland everything he saw, heard, and did. Garland, his breath now recovered, sits forward. "Do me one more favor will you?"

"'S that?"

"When you give your formal testimony, don't mention the part about Harold calling my wife my full-time whore. I don't think that detail will make a difference. And I don't want to upset Shannon."

"Mhm." Daryl doesn't think that detail would upset Shannon. Shannon would probably laugh that detail away. He thinks that detail upsets the sheriff. "Won't mention it."

Garland begins to struggle to his feet. Daryl stands and gives him a hand up. Just as the sheriff has gained his footing, a gunshot cracks through the air from the direction of the _Godspeed_. Both men jump and reach for weapons – Garland for the revolver that's not in his holster, and Daryl for the crossbow that's not on his back.

"Earl?" Garland yells. "Andrew?"

"We're all right!" Earl shouts from off the ship.

Garland's shoulders relax and tighten again at the snap of a rifle. Daryl peers out in the darkness over the water. The lanterns on the rowboats illuminate the scene. One of the fleeing naval officers is now slumped over the side of the boat, half in, half out. A deputy stands, balancing himself in the center of the pursuing rowboat, with his rifle poised. The other two deputies have dropped their oars and lifted their rifles, too. The second fleeing naval officer drops his gun and raises his hands.

"Alive, Timmy!" Garland shouts.

The standing man takes one hand off his rifle and raises it up, as though to say – _I'm trying, boss, I'm trying._

"Hell ya want that officer alive for?" Daryl asks. "'S obvious he done it. Could of just shot 'em from the docks."

"I want to know who else knew about it, if anyone," Garland explains. "And other than that traitor on that rowboat, I'm the last man in the entire government now. I want people to know I won't become a tyrant. That I'm a man of the law, and will _always_ be a man of the law, no matter how much power I have. So he will be tried by a jury of his peers."

Earl and Andrew are off the _Godspeed_ and back on the docks now. Andrew leads a handcuffed whore by the arm while Earl walks holding Garland's revolver pointed downward. "The other woman," Earl explains when he comes to a stop before the sheriff, "got ahold of your revolver somehow."

Garland takes the gun and slides it back into his holster. "It got knocked out of my hand when I tried to defend myself."

"Well, she pointed it at me," Earl says matter-of-factly, "so now she's dead."

When the other deputies arrive with the captured lieutenant, and force him onto the dock, Earl grabs hold of him.

"Sorry, boss," Timmy says, "but the other one's dead."

"Well good job getting this one, deputy." Garland turns to Earl and Andrew. "Lock those two in the cells. I'll be up to interview them later. Tell the undertaker there's work to do. Get Harold's body out of my cabin. Bring it down here. The rest of you - " He waves hand in a half circle around his deputies. "Help me gather all the bodies. The captain's body and the manager's and Hank's, the undertaker will prepare for a morning burial. The traitors, we'll pile on a raft, set them on fire, and send them down river. I don't want any drifters in here."

Daryl supposes that's what they call floaters.

"Yes, Sheriff," the deputies chorus. Earl mounts his horse with the captured lieutenant, and Andrew with the whore, and they thunder off. The other three deputies head toward the _Godspeed_ to carry out the dead whore.

"Whatchya want me to do?" Daryl asks.

"Go check on your woman and my family. Tell Shannon I'll likely be working all night. And then get yourself some sleep. And if you need a drink first, I've got half a mason jar of moonshine in the bottom left cabinet of the hutch."

[*]

When Daryl reaches the cabin – he jogs all the way back from the docks - Earl and Andrew are carrying Harold's body out, Shannon is soothing her wailing son, Grandma is mopping up the blood from the floor, and Carol is checking her stitches. Two have popped out an unraveled. When she sees Daryl, she drops her shirt, runs to him, and throws her arms around his neck. He wraps his arms around her waist and kisses her gratefully.

"Ya a'ight?" he breathes when her lips break away from his.

"Gotta be," she says.

Both go and clean the blood from their hands in a washing trough, by the light of an oil lamp, watching the clear water turn to a murky brown.

"I went an entire year without having to kill a man," Carol says as she washes. "And now I've killed two in the last nine days."

Daryl looks down at the rippling water as she scrubs. Her hands have come clean, but when she raises her ring finger, and turns it to catch the light of the oil lamp, he sees the Cherokee Rose has turned from white to pink. "The blood won't come all the way off," she says.

"Get ya another one. Whole damn box of 'em. Rings. Pick out whatever ya want."

"No. I don't want another one. I want this one." She runs a finger over the raised carving in the cameo. "It will remind me that there's beauty beneath the blood. That I have something _worth_ protecting. A life worth living for. There's a purpose to what we do, Daryl," she says softly. "And I'm okay with that."

"Yeah?"

She nods. "Yeah."

He leans over and kisses her gently.

When they get back to the cabin, The floor is largely clean, and the area rug from the bedroom now lies over the spot where the worst of the bloodstains must have been. Gary and Grandma are gone, and their bedroom door is shut.

"Sorry," Daryl tells Shannon. "Forgot to get that medicine."

Shannon laughs. She pulls Daryl in for a grateful hug and says, "Thank you. Thank you for saving my man." She steps back. "Little Gary's back asleep, medicine or no medicine, and my poor mama has _cried_ herself to sleep over the manager." She shakes her head and slumps onto the couch in the living room. "I can't believe I _made_ Garland go to that poker game!"

"You were just trying to help him in his career," Carol reassures her.

"Garland said to say he's working all night," Daryl tells her.

"Of course he is."

There's a knock on the door, and Shannon answers cautiously this time. It's Dr. Ahmad, come to check on Carol. He looks over her stitches and sighs. "Well, I guess it won't be much of a problem at this point. Except you might have a scar from here to here." He waves his finger over a section of her side. "I'll take the rest of them out tomorrow afternoon. But please rest tomorrow. No sewing, no work at all. You don't leave until Sunday morning, so make it a lazy Saturday." He leaves her some pain medicine and also drops off Gary's medicine, telling Shannon he noticed she hadn't picked it up this week.

"Thank you, doctor," Shannon tells him as she walks him to the door. She shakes her head after she's shut it. "I really thought Harold was one of the halfway decent ones. But he would have killed us both if Daryl wasn't there to save Garland, and you, Carol, weren't here to save me."

"You helped save yourself," Carol reminds her. "I'd be dead if you hadn't hit Harol both those times." She holds out her hand to Daryl. "We better get some rest."

"Mhmhm." He takes her hand, and together they walk to the bedroom.

[*]

Daryl's sitting on the bed, stripping off his socks in the flickering glow of the nightstand oil lamp, when Carol says, "I don't want to wait until Sunday."

"What?"

"I don't want to wait. If I pop some more stitches, who cares? They're about to come out anyway."

He sits there, a sock dangling from one hand. "Ya mean…"

"I _do_ mean."

"Thought ya wanted a fancy hotel. Ski lodge. Winery in the Blue Ridge mountains. Thought ya wanted somethin' special."

"This is something special," she says. "You're alive. I'm alive. We're alive together. And that's something special."

Daryl drops the sock. "A'ight." His stomach is doing all sorts of strange flips. Desire and excitement tumbles over his fear of disappointing her.

"You should probably be gentle though," she says as she walks toward him.

"Side hurting?"

"Not really. I just want it to be gentle our first time."

He stands and puts a hand on her hip. "Think I can do that." He wants to do that. Tonight, that's exactly what he wants – to be gentle with her. And maybe there's no other way to be with Carol.

He bends and kisses her. It's a long, soft, tentatively explorative kiss, and when she steps back, she asks, "Do you want to undress me?"

His fingers are trembling when he unbuttons her shirt. He's not sure why. They didn't tremble when they held the knives. He slips it from off her shoulders and it pools on the floor. Daryl slides her bra straps down her shoulders, one by one, admiring the blush of heat the act brings to her slender arms. The clasp is in the front, and he pops it free. He hums when her breasts spill out, and caresses them while she closes her eyes. He plays for a little while, trailing kisses down her cheek and to her lips while he circles her nipple lightly with a thumb. The kiss deepens, and he goes from circling to lightly pinching.

She's breathing hard when he tears his mouth away to concentrate on undoing her belt. Daryl fumbles with the button of her pants and there's a low rasp when he pulls the zipper down. He pushes her pants down, below her hips, and they slide naturally the rest of the way. She steps out of them, and he swallows.

Carol undoes the top button of his shirt and works her way down while he stands with a hand on each of her hips, admiring her. He has to help her wrench the shirt off when it sticks at the cuffs. When she starts undoing his belt, he thinks it's about the sexiest thing he's ever seen his life, this woman, his soon-to-be wife, in nothing but her panties, struggling with the silver prong of his buckle.

Frustrated, she pleads, "Help!" and he smiles and undoes the belt for her, then the top button, and finally the zipper before dropping his pants straight to the floor.

She must have forgotten he goes commando, because she gasps at the full erection that appears before her, and then she chuckles at her own gasp, which makes him chuckle too.

He nods at her panties. "Now you."

He likes the way her skin flushes pink in the light of the lamp as she slides them off. His eyes roam her naked form, hungry to take it all in, and her skin reddens. "Can we get under the covers now?" she asks.

He didn't anticipate this shyness, but he turns and yanks them down, waits for her to crawl under, crawls in with her, and then his mouth is on hers, and his hands are all over her, caressing every inch he can find, except for her wounded side. Her fingers explore him, too. She traces every sinew of his arms. There are sighs and gasps and little moans as they savor each other.

"Tell me how ya want it," Daryl murmurs in her ear.

"I want to be on top."

He rolls abruptly on his back, expects there to be some further kissing, caressing, some shy maneuvering on Carol's part, a gradual easing in to her. He doesn't expect her to straddle him immediately and impale herself on his erection, but that's exactly what she does, and she's as wet as he is hard and - "Oh sweet holy fuck!" he groans.

Carol gasps, reaches for balance, and he helps to hold her up as she begins to rock her hips. She whimpers and bites her lip as she starts slow, and then moans as she picks up pace. He tries to match her exactly, but he must thrust harder than he thinks, because it's, "Gentle please" and then "slower," but almost as soon, it's "harder!" "faster!"

He gives her what she wants, or at least he earnestly tries, turning his mind deliberately to mundane thoughts every time he thinks he won't make it a second longer. And his reward, eventually, is not a quiet pop and shudder, but a loud "Oh Daryl! Oh God! _Oh my God_!" followed by a long slow moan and violent shudder. He thrusts up hard one last time and grunts as he explodes inside her.

Carol collapses against him in a full body tremble that just keeps going.

[*]

Carol thinks her body will never stop trembling, but it does, eventually, stilling beside Daryl's warm slick flesh. His arms are strong and comforting around her, and her breath has leveled to normal. So has his.

"'S good?" he asks.

"Yes. I didn't know it could be so good."

He trails his fingertip up her spine, and she shifts in his arms, kisses his bare shoulder, and raises her head to look at him in the waning light of the oil lamp. "Thank you," she says, "for being so patient."

"Whatdaya mean?"

"I made you wait a long time."

"Been 'bout two weeks since we first kissed."

She laughs. It has, hasn't it? But it doesn't feel like that. And it hasn't been about two weeks since he first loved her, not judging by what he said in that courtroom about not being able to stand seeing her with Ezekiel. And it hasn't been two weeks since she first loved him, either. "Sometimes, I think it's been about seven years." She settles her head on his shoulder.

"Mhmhm. Well, ya know that Bible story."

"What Bible story?" she asks.

"One 'bout Jacob and Rachel. Jacob worked seven years for 'er, 'n it was like a day, 'cause of the love he had for 'er."

Carol bites down on her bottom lip to keep the smile from turning into a happy cry. "I didn't know you were such a Bible reader."

"Ain't. Just grew up in Georgia. Gonna hear 'bout it." His finger inches up her spine, sending a warm shiver through her flesh. "Never made any damn sense to me, why a man would want a woman that bad. But I get it now." Daryl's still trailing his fingertip lazily over her back when he falls asleep.


	41. Chapter 41

The next morning, when they awake, Daryl and Carol kiss and caress lazily. "Gotta go to work," Daryl says. "Last day."

She smiles softly and outlines his earlobe with her fingertip. "Are you looking forward to our road trip home?"

"Lookin' forward to enjoyin' you on the way." He nips at her shoulder and she laughs. He rolls out of bed, still naked, and begins pulling on his clothes.

Carol watches him. "You have a nice ass, Mr. Dixon."

"Pffft." He yanks up his pants over it.

"I should slap it like I rummy those cards."

"Stahp." He jerks up his zipper and buckles his belt and then turns and bends down and kisses her. He lifts the blanket to peek at her naked body, and she yanks it from him and covers up.

"You'll just get worked up again," she scolds him.

"Go back to sleep," he insists. " _Rest_. Doctor's orders. Got a long trip ahead of us tomorrow."

[*]

When Daryl comes out, Gary is playing with his cars on the floor, and the kettle is whistling on the wood stove. "Did you sleep well last night, Daryl?" Shannon asks with a smile as she pulls down a tea cup.

He flushes when he realizes she must have heard them. "Mhmm. Real good."

"I bet you did. I suppose Carol is sleeping in?"

"Yeah. But'm ready for work."

"No work for you today, sugar. You're released of your last six hours of obligation. All work is grinding to a halt, except the bare minimum necessary. It'll be a day off for mourning for the captain and the manager and Hank. Want some black tea?"

"Yes'm."

Carol emerges from the bedroom, despite Daryl's order that she go back to sleep, and so Shannon pulls down another cup for her. Shannon's just finished pouring hot water over tea bags in three cups when Garland opens the front door, looking haggard. "Oh, baby, you need some sleep!" Shannon tells him.

"I can't. There's the funeral in an hour, and then I best hold a town meeting to squash all the rumors and explain where we go from here. At least I'll be too tired to be nervous about the public speaking bit."

"Then I better get you some tea, too." She draws down another cup. "What did you find out?"

Garland slumps into a wooden chair at the table in the kitchen nook. "The lieutenant we captured wasn't talking. But the whore sang like a canary once I promised her I'd take the death penalty off the table."

"Now why would you do that!" Shannon exclaims. "She killed the captain!"

"It was the dead one who killed the captain and tried to shoot Earl," Garland tells her.

"Well then she got Hank killed," Shannon insists.

"True," Garland agrees. "But I got a lot of information out of her. A lot. Let's just say Harold was a _frequent_ client of hers, and I confirmed that with the madam's account books."

"They keep account books?" Carol asks skeptically as she takes her cup of tea from Shannon's hands.

"The madam does." Garland accepts the tea cup Shannon pushes over to him and dunks the bag up and down. "Down to the penny, believe it or not. Or should I say the ounce. And the lieutenant was a frequent visitor to the other conspirator."

"Harold told me he never visited the whores," says Shannon, holding out a cup of tea to Daryl.

Daryl takes the cup and blows across it. The steam rises and curls. "Harold told a lotta lies."

"I interviewed everyone down at the whorehut," Garland continues, "and I don't think any of the other women were in on it. We turned the officers' cabins on the ships upside down and inside out. Had to break into some locked chests, but we found written communications. They've been planning the mutiny for weeks. Between what the whore told me and what I found…I'm pretty sure none of the other sailors were in on it. Harold's plan was that he would become the head of Jamestown, of course, and then he'd appoint his lieutenant commander as sheriff and his lieutenant as manager."

"The lieutenant doesn't know jack shit about farm management!" Shannon exclaims. "He'd have run Jamestown into the ground!"

"Actually, as it turns out, he has a B.A. in agricultural management from Texas A&M. He joined the Navy when he ran out of money for graduate school. He's wanted the manager's position ever since John was promoted to captain, but the captain passed him over for Rodrigo, who was a high school dropout, and that apparently embittered the lieutenant."

"Well Rodrigo did a damn good job," Shannon says.

"The captain did have an eye for talent," Garland agrees. "Just not for loyalty, I guess. It seems Harold had a long-term plan. He was going to tread gingerly for the first two months, get the people to trust their new government, keep the old ways. Then he was going to propose just one small change to the charter."

"What change?" Daryl asks.

"No personal firearms. He was going to propose it as a way to avoid accidents and drunken altercations, for the safety of the people, of course."

"Of course," Carol says dryly.

"Only the patrol and guards and officers and manager would get firearms, and they'd all be appointed by Harold, of course. And as judge of the court, he would guide the selection of a favorable jury to approve the change. Then, in another month, when the people had gotten used to being disarmed, he'd scrap the charter and juries entirely and establish martial law. Do whatever the hell he wanted."

Shannon shakes her head. "Positively Machiavellian. I didn't know Harold had it in him. And I thought I was good judge of character."

"Some detective I am," Garland mutters. "I didn't see _any_ of it coming."

"'Cause ya didn't hang with 'em," Daryl says.

"A fair point. I see now why my lovely wife has so often pushed me to do so."

"My pushing almost got you killed," Shannon says.

"My blinders almost got me killed." Garland sighs. "All along I've thought Harold would make a better captain than the captain. Captain John was lewd and crude, greedy and mildly corrupt, but he _never_ would have done _anything_ like that. For the most part, he honored the charter. John risked his life for Jamestown, against cannibals and raiders, again and again. But if you had put those two men before me, two days ago, and had asked me to choose which was the better…" He laughs bitterly.

"Don't beat yerself up over it," Daryl tells him. "Can't see through everyone."

"And you were right about one thing," Carol says. "You told Shannon Harold was the most competent of all the naval officers. And he was. Competent enough to almost pull off a mutiny."

"He _would_ have pulled it off, if not for you and Daryl. And for your assistance, I will be forever grateful."

[*]

Daryl and Carol linger on the periphery of the funeral, inside the bulwark, leaned back against a cannon and looking through the window toward the graveyard. The whole town is there, in the field behind the crosses, except probably the guards at the front gates.

"Damn that's a lotta people," Daryl mutters.

Grandma Bonnie, a skinny thing, struggles, weeping, to lift a shovel of dirt to dump on the manager's coffin. Shannon assists her. Later, when Hank is being buried, Garland tips his hat to the coffin while it's being lowered. When it's time for the captain's coffin to be sunk into the depths of the earth, two of the women from the whorehut throw themselves on it, wailing.

"Damn," Daryl murmurs. "Think they actually loved 'em?"

"Maybe they're mourning their lost income."

Daryl chuckles, and then growls at himself for laughing. Carol frowns at herself, too. "He wasn't an _evil_ man," Carol says. "He didn't deserve to die that way."

After all the coffins are lowered, the town crier, in his booming voice, announces there will be a town meeting on the docks in one hour.

When that hour arrives, Daryl and Carol join the crowd, at a distance, by sitting atop a low stone wall in the grass behind the docks. The sheriff stands on the deck of the _Susan Constant_ and speaks through a portable, battery operated microphone taken from the museum, so everyone can hear him.

Children run about the docks, weaving in and out from among the standing adults, while elders sit on benches. The crowd murmurs like a bee hive, as rumors over what happened last night drift from person to person. Garland silences them. Then he explains, as succinctly as he can, what happened. He tells them of Daryl and Carol's roles in thwarting his own murder, adding, "So the jury who released them? You can all be proud of your decision."

There's clapping, but Daryl doesn't know if it's for him and Carol or for the jury.

"There will be a trial for treason," Garland announces. "I have no further suspects at this time beyond those who are in jail, and you can anticipate no witch hunts."

Sighs of relief bubble through the crowd.

"Does this mean _you're_ captain now?" a man in farmer's overalls shouts.

"I'm not sure I _deserve_ to be your captain," the sheriff replies through his microphone, and the whispering crowd falls silent in shock. "This is my second major misjudgment since I've been here. I didn't see this conspiracy coming, any more than I saw that raid coming."

"You solved the old sheriff's murder!" a deputy shouts.

"You solved the rape of that poor girl!" a fisherman shouts. "You caught the fugitives!"

"You located those missing scavengers!" a woman yells.

"You saved my whole family!" a teenage boy shouts. "We were starving in the wilderness, and you brought us all to safety here at Jamestown."

The shouts of support begin to overlap each other, and Garland holds out a hand to silence them and the voices die down bit by bit.

"There's much to be done," Garland says, "and you do need someone who's been in the government to set things in motion. I'll be that man for you, at first. But now that our government has imploded, and I'm the only one left, I think it's time for an actual _election_. On Wednesday, you will all have a chance to elect eight representatives of your own to replace the old hierarchy, not with a new hierarchy, but with a council of equals, a town council."

Whispering rips through the crowd.

"I will, for the time being, serve as the ninth member and chairman of that council," the sheriff continues, "as it finds its footing, but three months from now, we'll hold elections again, including for _my_ position of chairman. From that point on, after the transition, elections will be annual. But in three months, if you think I've served you well in this time of transition, you can elect me to continue that role. And if you don't, you can throw me out."

The crowd hums with murmurs of surprise.

"What say you, people of Jamestown? Shall we forge forward with a representative democracy?"

The crowd erupts in cheers. Carol laughs and leans back against Daryl's shoulder as fisherman hats and straw hats and baseball caps and sailor's caps go flying in the air.


	42. Chapter 42

Shannon tells her husband to get some sleep, but Garland insists he has more work to do in the captain's old office. An hour before dinner is ready, Shannon asks Daryl to retrieve him. Daryl finds the sheriff asleep at the captain's desk, face down in a sea of manila file folders and ledgers.

Garland snorts awake when Daryl raps his knuckles on the desk. "How long have I been passed out here?"

"Hell if I know. But supper's almost ready."

Garland rubs his eyes and follows Daryl out of the office. As they walk past the herb garden with the field of flags just outside the museum, the sheriff says, "I need to ask you a favor, which I have no right to ask. I'm trying to arrange a speedy trial for the traitors. Jury selection should be complete by tomorrow afternoon. I was hoping you and Carol would stay on just one more day so you can give your testimony in person in court and then leave Monday morning instead."

Daryl's throat rumbles with an uncertain noise.

"You're under no obligation. I can have the court reporter take your formal depositions in the morning before you leave instead. It won't be as convincing, but…It will have to do."

"Let me talk to Carol 'bout it. See what she wants to do."

They fall silent for a while. The sheriff seems to be brooding. When they're on the dock near the _Godspeed_ , Daryl asks, "Somethin' else on yer mind? Leavin' soon. Ain't like 'm gonna talk."

"My wife is clever," Garland replies. "That would surprise a lot of people. I know Shannon can seem…"

"Flaky?"

"Some of that's an act," Garland, unoffended, replies. "She prefers that people underestimate her. And some of it's just her lively personality, just a part of who she is. But she's clever. She's well read, and – with the exception of the mutineers – usually a good reader of people. She's a great influencer of people as well. I know this about my wife. So for one terrible moment, when I first surfaced under that dock, and I was holding myself up by the pier to breathe…For one terrible moment, I thought Shannon was in on it." He grits his teeth. "She pushed so hard for me to go to that damn game. She pushed so hard."

Daryl doesn't say anything because there's nothing he can say. He thinks maybe Garland just needs a confessor.

"She thought she was supporting me. Supporting my career. I know that. But for one terrible moment…" Garland shakes his head. "I doubted and my world collapsed. Have you ever doubted Carol like that?"

"Nah." That's no comfort to Garland, but Daryl's not going to lie. He's never doubted Carol's loyalty. The closest he ever came to doubting _her_ was when Rick told him she'd killed Karen and David. But he never doubted her _loyalty_. Carol had done it out of loyalty, after all, to protect her family. So he'd told Rick, _That's her, but_ _that ain't her_. It was the best he could do, at the time, to wrap his head around what she'd done.

"I want Shannon's forgiveness for that doubt," Garland continues, "but I don't want her to _know_ about that doubt, so I can never have her forgiveness." He sighs and runs the back of his hand across his mouth. "Have you ever kept anything from Carol?"

Daryl's puzzled why this man seems to be looking toward him as if he's some sort of fount of relationship advice, but he answers. "Yeah." At that little house on the outskirts of the Kingdom, he lied and told her everyone was fine back home in Alexandria. He couldn't break her heart again. It had been broken too many ways already. "Shouldn't of, maybe." He still doesn't know if that was the wrong thing to do, but Carol never held it against him.

Garland falls silent again. When the dock gives way to the dirt and gravel path along the farm fields, he says, "Jamestown is about to change and, God willing, for the better, but I've got a long road ahead of me."

"But ya ain't gonna walk it alone," Daryl assures him. "Shannon'sgonna be there. By yer side. Every damn step of the way."

[*]

That night, after dinner, when they go to the living room for tea, Garland promptly falls asleep, sitting up on the couch, with his head on Shannon's shoulder. Carol carefully takes the teacup from his hand and sets it on the end table, and then tells Shannon, "I think we're turning in. Daryl and I talked about the trial. We'll testify tomorrow afternoon and leave on Monday morning instead."

"Oh thank you!" Shannon half whispers. "Garland will be so relived. And, I'm not gonna lie. I'll enjoy one more night with y'all."

Carol locks the door to the bedroom when they go inside. Daryl looks at her curiously when she does it. "Shannon told me her mother walked in on them once," Carol explains. "Well, ran in on them, with a kitchen knife. She thought Garland was hurting Shannon."

"This mean we're havin' sex?" Daryl asks.

"What do you think it means?"

Daryl grins, wraps an arm around her, and draws her flush against his chest. He scrapes her earlobe with his teeth. When she shivers in response, that alone is enough to turn him on.

[*]

The sounds of early morning life in the settlement mingle with Carol's dreams. Someone is sawing wood, and Carol dreams of Daryl sawing open a walker. Only in her dream he's not with Rick. He's with her. She's watching him drive down his knife into the walker and rip down from the chest– thunk, _saw, saw, saw_ , thunk _saw, saw, saw_ , thunk, _saw, saw, saw_. She's watching and crying, "Did it eat my baby?"

Daryl, so young, so much less grizzled, his cheeks almost clean shaven around his feather-light goatee, reaches into the walker's gut and pulls out a mangled hunk of undigested fur. Carol's reaching for the bloody mess when a church bell rings.

"Sophia!" cries Daryl, his voice lighter, less graveled by cigarettes and time. He goes crashing through the woods, snapping branches on the ground, his crossbow loose in one hand, while Carol runs fast behind, crying, "How do you know it didn't eat my baby?"

"'Cause I cut the motherfucker – "

"- Open." Daryl's real-life voice jerks her out of the dream. He's standing naked by the bedroom window. He closes the shutters and lets the latch fall into the eyehole lock. "Damn that chapel bell is loud." He crawls into the bed and pulls her back against his chest. He must sense the sad tension in her, because he says, "'S wrong?"

"I don't want to talk about it." She rolls over in his arms, urges him on his back, and settles her head against his chest. "Just hold me."

He does, but there's a stiffness in his muscles. "'S a'ight last night?" he asks finally. "The sex?"

"Of course. The sex was good."

"I ain't got to do it that way again, if ya don't like it."

All he did was flip her over onto her stomach after she came, lift her slightly onto her knees, and finish by taking her from behind. "That way's fine."

"If ya don't like somethin', Carol, just tell me. Don't want ya doin' what ya did with – " He's about to say Ezekiel, Carol realizes, but he falls silent.

"I'm not upset about the sex." She lifts her head to look at him. "I just had a really bad dream."

"What dream?"

"It was about Sophia," she admits, because keeping it in isn't going to make the pain any lighter, and he's here to share her burden, after all. He was there back then, too.

Daryl reaches out and with the callused tip of his thumb wipes a single stray tear from beneath her eye. He does a partial sit up to kiss the damp spot along her cheek, and then lies back down again so she can curl against him. His arms are no longer tense around her, and she sinks into them.

Carol cries a little more, wetting his flesh with her tears, and then pulls away and swipes them all away. She kisses his bare shoulder, props her head up by one hand, and lies sideways to look at him. "I'll tell you if I don't like something in bed. I promise. But you know…it's not all about what I like. I care about what you like, too."

"Ain't 'n issue," he says. "'Cause ain't nothin' I don't like."

She splutters out a laugh and he smiles. "Oh, I bet I could find something you don't like," she assures him.

"Nah."

"Well, I found this." With two fingers, she tickles a vulnerable spot just above his hip.

"Stahp!" He twists away.

She attacks the same spot again, and he laughs like a little boy and squirms more, so she comes in for the tickle again.

Daryl seizes her wrists in each of his hands, rolls her onto her back and pins her arms against the bed above her head. "I said stahp." Then his tongue snakes out from between his lips as he rakes his eyes over her naked breasts.

Carol's stomach growls, loudly, and she laughs.

Daryl sighs and throws himself on his back. The bed shifts slightly. "Better rustle ya up some grub, huh?" he asks.

"I could eat."

The little wattle and daub cabin is emptied of its residents when Daryl and Carol emerge into the living room. The blankets Garland and Shannon have been using to make their nest before the fire are neatly folded on the back of the couch, and the two pillows are stacked against either arm. There's a note on the little wooden table in the kitchen nook, lain between two plates covered in tinfoil.

 _Went to Sunday service. Left you this breakfast. Trial's at 3 pm. Feel free to explore Jamestown and enjoy your day off until then. And THANK YOU again. – Shannon_

Steam seeps out from underneath the tin foil as Daryl strips it back. The plate is near overflowing with scrambled eggs, real bacon, breakfast potatoes mixed with onions, and fresh strawberries. Shannon has also left them two 8-ounce glasses filled with apple juice that looks like it was recently defrosted. A few thin chunks of ice still float on its surface.

"You should save Garland's life more often," Carol teases as she enjoys the decadent thank-you breakfast.

Daryl shovels food into his mouth, and between bites, says, "They actually go to church?"

"Well why not?"

"'S the point of that shit?"

"I go." Carol puts her fork down and draws her cup of apple juice toward herself.

Daryl slows in his eating and looks up from his plate at her. "Ya go? To church?"

"We have a service in the school theater on Saturday evening. I go. There's a former rabbi who runs it."

"Rabbi?" he asks.

"It's ecumenical. He doesn't mention Jesus, of course, but lots of Christians also come and say their own prayers in their own way. Nabila comes, too, and she's Muslim. There's music and singing and he gives a little inspirational talk. People share prayer requests. It's nice."

"Don't expect me to go, do ya?" he almost shouts.

"Well, not if it alarms you that much!" she replies.

He lowers his voice. "Just don't get the point. God ain't exactly been answerin' prayers 'round here."

She smiles. "Well, you don't know what prayers I've prayed." She sips her juice. "Don't worry. I won't ask you to go. But you could try it one time. Just to see if you like it."

"Ain't gonna like it."

"Well, that's decided," she says. "Anything else you know you'll never like without even trying it?" She takes a big sip of juice.

"Anal."

Juice splutters out of Carol's mouth. Daryl wipes it from his face with his fingers and then begins to suck the juice off his fingers.

When Carol's done laughing, she says, "I thought you said there's _nothing_ you don't like."

"Thought that one was understood," he says. "That hole's exit only."

Carol shrugs. "Well, it doesn't interest me anyway. But how do you feel about cunnilingus?"

"Colonel who?"

Carol rolls her eyes, and Daryl chuckles. "Ain't an expert," he says. "But 'm happy to practice on ya 'til I become one."

After breakfast, Daryl and Carol take a walk around Jamestown, exploring all the nooks and crannies, getting ideas, and discussing improvements to the Kingdom.

Then they row out onto the James River in a rowboat, drop anchor, strip down to their underwear, and take a swim. They splash each other playfully, and Daryl gives chase when Carol tries to flee.

She's no match for him in the water, and he tugs her back to the row boat, where they hold onto the side with one hand while they kiss. When they see the bow of the _Susan Constant_ turning a bend in the river, Daryl hefts her back in the boat and scurries in after her to pull up anchor, row to the side, and clear a path. She dresses quickly, not wanting the fishermen or sailors to whistle when they sail by, or, more to the point, not wanting Daryl to try to scale the ship and punch them if they do.

They have a late lunch at picnic table in the grass along the docks, because some men who are eating there invite them to share in their rations.

As they eat, the men ask a lot of questions. "Is it true you killed two at once, with a knife in each hand?" one of the fishermen asks Daryl.

"How did you overpower a man as tall as the commander?" a farmer asks Carol.

"You killed all five of them?" a sailor asks.

"The sheriff got one, I heard," a second farmer insists. "Isn't that right?"

"I never liked the lieutenant," one of the men says. "He was always bossing us fishermen around, when he doesn't know jack about dropping a net."

"He deserves to fry," the sailor agrees. "I can't believe all those officers were in on it. They were going to wipe out the best men in the government!"

"Did wipe out two of them," a farmer says. "At least the sheriff made it out alive."

"Can you believe he doesn't want to be captain?"

"Well, he'll be captain," another man says. "Just a different kind of captain, I guess."

"Who's going to be manager, though?"

The questions fly back and forth as the fish disappears from tin plates and is washed down with water.

Later, Daryl and Carol are relaxing on a bench in the settlement, watching children play horseshoes in the dirt courtyard, when Garland comes to get them for the trial.


	43. Chapter 43

Gawkers pack the pews of the chapel to watch the trial. Still more, looking like they just stepped out of the fields or off the docks, stand leaned against the walls. The defendants – the captured Lieutenant Brown, and the apprehended whore Mary Anderson – sit on the side pew on the stage with their defense attorney. Carol is sandwiched between Daryl and Shannon in the first row on the left – the witnesses' pew - as Garland takes the stage.

"This being a criminal case," Garland announces to the packed courtroom, "the prosecution and defense will be asking all the questions today. Usually the captain presides over these trials as judge, but as he is no longer with us, I've appointed Ana Carter to play that role."

There are some doubtful murmurs in the crowd of onlookers. Garland raises a hand to silence them. "She won't have the power to overturn the jury's verdict," he assures them. "The jury's verdict will stand on its own today. She's just going to keep things on track during the trial. I chose her because she was a judge before the Great Sickness, and she knows our legal customs well. I'm appointing her _today_ , but it will be up to the Town Council – once we _have_ a Town Council - to confirm her in that position going forward."

Garland comes down from the stage and squeezes into the last seat in the witnesses' pew beside Shannon.

Earl, the deputy-bailiff, intones, "All rise. Court is in session. The Honorable Judge Ana Carter presiding."

A middle-age woman with long, black hair emerges from the sacristy, smiles at Earl, and takes a seat at the makeshift bench. "All may be seated."

As bottoms thud into pews, the court reporter picks up her pencil and poises it against her legal pad.

The defense attorney has apparently advised his clients not to testify, and Daryl is the first to be called to the stand – a blue plastic chair beside the bench. He gives his account of events in response to questions from the prosecutor, Marcus Washington, a tall black man in dark blue jeans and a crisp, white polo shirt. "Thank you for your testimony today," Marcus says when Daryl has provided all the details. "I have no further questions."

"Do you wish to cross examine, James?" the judge asks the defense attorney.

The defense attorney, an auburn-haired man in black slacks and a white button-down dress shirt, rises, strolls over to stand beside Daryl, and clears his throat. "You say the lieutenant commander attempted to slit Sheriff Garland's throat?"

"Yeah."

"At any time, did the defendant – " James points to the captured lieutenant in the side pew on the stage – "attempt to kill the sheriff?"

"Well, he knocked the gun out his hand," Daryl answers.

"The gun out of the sheriff's hand?" James asks. "So the sheriff was aiming a gun at my client?"

"Well, 'cause the lieutenant commander was tryin' to slit his throat. 'N Commander Harrison, he'd just slit the manager's throat. 'N the whore had just stabbed the captain."

"Please refer to the co-defendant as _Mary Anderson_ ," the judge tells Daryl, "or as _the defendant_ , and not as _the whore_."

"Yes'm."

"If the _lieutenant commander_ was trying to slit Sheriff Garland's throat," James asks, "why did Sheriff Garland aim the gun at my client _,_ the _lieutenant_?"

The prosecutor rises. "Objection. Speculation."

The judge pounds her gavel. "Sustained. James, that's a question you can pose to Sheriff Garland."

James nods. "So you saw the defendant knock a gun out of Sheriff Garland's hand. A gun that was pointed directly _at_ the defendant?"

"Yeah," Daryl mutters.

"Did you see my client, Lieutenant Brown, kill the manager?"

"Well, no," Daryl mumbles. "Harold did that."

"Did you see Lieutenant Brown stab the captain in the neck?"

"Well, no, the ho – _Mary_ \- did that, but he – "

" – No will suffice," James interrupts him. "Did Lieutenant Brown attempt to kill you personally?"

"Well, no, not me, but he was out on – "

"- No will suffice," James interrupts again. "So in summary, you didn't see the defendant kill _anyone_?"

"Seen 'em help bring the captain down! Took all five of 'em officers to do it."

"That's the captain!" a man standing in the back of the church shouts. "He don't go down easy!"

The audience erupts in agreement.

The judge bangs her gavel. "Order!"

The murmuring audience falls silent.

"Well there was quite a tumult onboard that deck I imagine," James says. "And you were watching from a distance. In the dark. By starlight and moonlight."

"'N there were lanterns on the ship," Daryl insists.

"But it was _dark_. And at a _distance_. How do you _know_ the defendant was trying to bring the captain down instead of trying to save him from the others?"

"'Cause I seen 'em toss the captain's body overboard with the others! 'N then I seen 'em get in a rowboat to go lookin' for the sheriff to kill 'em."

"How do you know he wasn't looking for the sheriff to rescue him?"

"'Cause I heard Harold order the lieutenant commander to split up 'n find Garland to kill 'em!"

"You heard Commander Harrison order the _lieutenant commander_ ," James says. "Here we are, back to the _lieutenant commander_ , who is not with us today and cannot testify as to my client's role, if any, in these events. How do you know it wasn't the intention of my client, Lieutenant Brown, to find Sheriff Garland in order to rescue him?"

Carol can see Daryl growing frustrated and hopes he doesn't lose his cool. "Well, 'cause he was in on it!"

"How do you _know_ he was in on it? Do you have a window into his heart, mind, and soul?"

"Don't need no fuckin' window!" Daryl growls. "Seen 'em up there. Helpin' the rest."

"Language," the judge warns Daryl.

"How do you know things didn't simply unravel all around the lieutenant," James asks, "and he found himself caught up in the midst of it, and like you, he bided his time in order to attempt to save the sheriff?"

"He pulled a gun on the deputies!" Daryl insists.

"Did he fire it, or did he drop it?"

"Well…he dropped it when they – "

"- He pulled his gun out," James interrupts. "To drop it when the deputies came to apprehend him. He surrendered to the deputies. He _cooperated_ with the deputies. My two clients, in fact, were the _only_ ones to cooperate with the deputies, and so they were the _only_ ones to come out of this whole fiasco alive. Now why do you _imagine_ the lieutenant _cooperated_ , if he was _in_ on it? The penalty for treason is death. So if my client was really in on it, why wouldn't he go out guns blazing? Why wouldn't he – "

"Objection!" The prosecutor stands. "Speculation. _And_ leading the witness _and_ the jury."

"Sustained." Ana pounds her gavel. "That's the second time, James. Tread lightly."

James looks Ana over warily, but he nods and says, "I have no further questions for this witness."

Carol can feel the tension radiating off of Daryl when he sits down next to her. She puts a hand on his knee and squeezes.

The prosecutor calls Garland to the stand next, and his testimony pretty much destroys the defensive case James was trying to make on behalf of the lieutenant. Garland refers to the correspondence he discovered in the ship's cabins indicating that the lieutenant was to be given the manager's old position.

Earl, the bailiff-deputy, brings forth the evidence bags containing the letters to the bench, smiling at Ana as he sets them down.

"Did you see the co-defendant," James asks, pointing to the whore, "kill anyone or attempt to kill anyone?"

"No," Garland replies. "But she distracted Hank so the sailors could slit his throat."

"She distracted him? And how did she manage that?"

Garland shifts uncomfortably and clears his throat. His face flushes slightly. "She…uh

…leaned over the deck of the _Godspeed_ ," Garland stutters, "sans shirt, and proceeded to…uh…shake her…assets."

A man in the audience, who sits at the end of the last pew, lets out a cat-calling whistle. The judge slams her gavel down. "Order! Do that again and I'll hold you in contempt."

"You can hold me any way you like, sweetheart," the man replies.

"Bailiff," Ana says wearily.

"Gladly." Earl strides down the aisle, seizes the man by the arm, and drags him out of the pew. The man objects as Earl shoves him backward out the chapel door.

A few men disappear outside to watch the unfolding scene, but the court returns to order.

"So, in other words," James says, "my client merely did what she was paid to do? Which was to entertain the men onboard the _Godspeed_?"

"Hank wasn't onboard the _Godspeed_ ," Sheriff Garland replies.

"No, Hank wasn't onboard the _Godspeed_ , was he?" the defense attorney says to the jury. He then turns back to the stand. "But _you_ were. Maybe she was just bent over that rail because she was shaking her ass for _you_ , Sheriff."

Garland flushes completely red.

"I mean," James continues, "she _was_ paid to entertain _you_ , was she not?"

The prosecutor stands. "Objection. Relevance."

The judge pounds her gavel. "Overruled. I'll allow it. Sheriff, answer the question."

"I believe she was hired by the captain to serve drinks to the men at the poker game, including me."

"Hired by the captain?" James asks.

"Yes."

"Not by _my client_ , the _lieutenant_?"

"I don't know what role the lieutenant did or did not play in the hiring, but your client was a regular client of both of the professional ladies onboard the _Godspeed_ that night, as was Commander Harrison."

"So in short, you have no evidence that my client, Mary Anderson, was actually involved in this conspiracy at all, do you?"

"She _told_ me she was," Garland answers. "Lieutenant Brown told her that when he was manager, she could be the manager's wife, and all she had to do was distract the patrolman during the poker game."

"So she didn't know they were actually going to kill Hank?" James asks. "Or the manager? Or the captain? Or you?"

"I don't know how else she imagines Lieutenant Brown would have become manager."

"Is it possible she could have thought there was going to be a bloodless reorganization? That she thought all of you had gathered on that boat that day to discuss a restructuring of the government, the way you yourself hope to restructure the government going forward?"

The prosecutor springs up. "Objection. Speculation."

Ana pounds her gavel. "Sustained. The sheriff cannot know your client's mind, James. That's a question to pose to her, _if_ you let her take the stand."

"I have no further questions for this witness."

Garland hastens off stage and sighs his way into the pew. Shannon kisses his cheek and says, "Good job, baby."

The madam of the whorehut is called to the stand next, and her account books are submitted as evidence. She's in her sixties and reminds Carol of her own mother at that age – a little plump, a little white-haired, a little wrinkled, but with a hint, behind the eyes, of the great beauty she once was, before time and men wore her down.

Madam Linda testifies of the commander and lieutenant's frequent visits to the whorehut and of their repeated preference for the two particular whores who were onboard the _Godspeed_ that night.

"And did you overhear any private conversations between my client, Mary Anderson, and either the lieutenant or the commander?" James asks her.

"No," Madam Linda replies, "but we have room dividers in the hut. There's some measure of privacy, and I don't make it my business to listen in."

"Well, I can't imagine there's a lot of pillow talk in a brothel," James says.

"You'd be surprised."

Earl is called to the stand next and testifies of boarding the _Godspeed_ to recover the whores and having to shoot one of the two when she leveled the sheriff's revolver at him.

"But my client, Mary Anderson, did not attempt to assault you in any way?" James asks.

"No," Earl answers. "She surrendered, once we found her, but she was in hiding down below deck."

"When you recovered the captain's body, were you able to ascertain which knife wounds came from which knives?"

"No, but there were a lot of knife wounds. Fourteen, to be exact. It took all five officers to bring – "

"- or so Daryl and Garland tell you. You weren't there, were you?" James asks.

"No."

Next, one of the deputies who apprehended Lieutenant Brown is called to the stand. On the cross-examination, he's asked by the defense attorney, "Did the defendant, Lieutenant Brown, attempt to shoot you?"

"He pulled his gun, along with the lieutenant commander."

"Did he attempt to shoot you?" James repeats.

"I shot the lieutenant commander when he pointed his gun at me," the deputy replies. "At which point Lieutenant Brown dropped his gun."

"So he did _not_ attempt to shoot you?"

"I believe he would have shot me," the deputy replies, "if I had not made it clear I would shoot him as I did the lieutenant commander."

"Did you recover Lieutenant Brown's knife?" James asks.

"No. I presume he dropped it in the - "

"- No presumptions," the attorney interrupts. "So you have no evidence the lieutenant was among those who stabbed the captain?"

"We have eyewitness testimony from Daryl Dixon and the sheriff," the deputy replies.

"Eyewitness testimony from the sheriff, in the midst of a very confusing tumult, and from Mr. Dixon, in the darkness, from the docks?"

"Objection! Framing."

"Sustained." The judge pounds her gavel.

"No further questions for this witness."

The undertaker is called to testify as to the nature of the bodies he prepared for burning or burial. Finally, Carol must take her place in the blue plastic chair beside the judge's bench. With the leading of the prosecutor, she gives her testimony, and then steadies herself for the defense attorney's questions. She's seen what he's done to Daryl, Garland, and the deputies.

"When you unsheathed your knife, what had Commander Harrison done to Shannon?"

"He was moving in to stab her," Carol answers calmly and firmly.

"He had his knife drawn and raised?"

"He'd unsnapped his sheath," she replies.

"So he _didn't_ have his knife drawn and raised when you drew yours?"

"Because I didn't _let_ him get it drawn and raised," she replies, and some woman in the audience shouts, "You go, girl!" which means the judge has to call for order again.

"So the commander heard you unsheathing your knife," James asks, "and turned to defend himself against an attack from behind?"

"A _defense_ from behind," Carol says.

"Well that's a strange definition of _defense_ , now, isn't it?"

"I was defending Shannon."

"Against the commander's knife?" James asks. "Which was _not_ drawn?"

"Not _yet_ drawn," Carol corrects him. "He'd unsnapped the sheath. He had his hand on the hilt."

"So, for all you know, he was planning to help Shannon cut a loose string that had come unraveled from her shirt when you made the rash decision to yank your knife out and come at him?"

"I don't think he locked the cabin door behind himself in order to help her with a string."

There's snickering in the pews.

"And he promptly kicked me in my wounded side," Carol continues, "and then came in and tried to stab me."

"After _you_ tried to stab _him_?" James asks.

"I didn't try to stab him initially. I unsheathed my knife to have it handy in case he tried to stab Shannon. Which I was quite certain he planned to do. I stabbed him after he kicked me against the table, tried to stab me, and was only prevented from doing so by Shannon slamming the shotgun across his back."

"When he arrived at the cabin, did Harold say anything to you whatsoever about my client?" James points to the lieutenant.

"No," Carol says.

"So you knew nothing whatsoever about the purported conspiracy when these events in the cabin unraveled?"

"No."

"And so you have no reason to believe my client the lieutenant even _knew_ that Harold was paying you ladies a visit?" James asks. "And certainly no reason to believe my client, Mary Anderson, knew that Commander Harrison was paying you ladies a visit? No reason to believe either of my clients were in any way complicit in whatever activity unraveled in that cabin?"

"Objection!" shouts the prosecutor. "Speculation and leading."

"Save it for your closing, James," Ana warns the defense attorney.

"I have no further questions for this witness."

When Shannon takes the stand, she gives a very lively, descriptive testimony that has the jury and the entire courtroom enthralled. She paints Harold as a master villain in a movie, and Carol as her winged savior from on high, and downplays her own role in making her way to the guns over the fireplace or in twice slamming Harold across the back with unloaded firearms.

"It was just beastly," Shannon says, "the way Harold kicked poor Carol right where that fugitive stabbed her! Like he was _trying_ to inflict the most pain possible! Like he just _knew_ all his ambitious plans were unravelling before his very eyes." She leans forward and looks right at the women in the jury. "You know that look a man gets in his eyes, when he sees his power slipping from him." The women in the jury nod.

"Objection!" says James. "Leading the jury."

"Sustained."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Shannon says innocently. "I just can't get that desperate look of Harold's out of my memories. It haunts my dreams. I think he would have slaughtered both of us, and then my mama, and then my baby boy, and all so that dreadful _lieutenant - "_ She motions to the witness box. "Could be manager like he _always_ wanted."

The eyes of the jury turn to the lieutenant, who tries to make his face an unreadable wall.

"And poor Hank," Shannon continues. She looks at the men in the jury now. "Being manipulated by a woman like that, when he was just a hardworking man, _trying_ to do his job, and she played on his vulnerabilities to make him vulnerable to the blade."

The men in the jury shift uncomfortably.

"Objection!" James cries.

"Sustained," the judge says. "The witness will stick to answering the questions."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Shannon says, but Carol doesn't think she's sorry at all, and, despite the defense attorney's objections, and his obfuscations, in the end, Shannon, as the last witness, leaves the jury with the lingering impression of the defendants' guilt. Apparently the prosecutor knew what he was doing when he made her the last witness to take the stand.

Shannon rejoins Carol in the witness pew, and the attorneys make their brief closing statements. The jury remains to deliberate in the chapel as the pews are cleared.


	44. Chapter 44

While the jury is deliberating, Shannon takes Carol to the storehouse and pulls down the big cardboard box marked _silver and gold_ because, she says, "You're getting married in a few weeks and you and Daryl are going to need rings."

"This is going to double as my wedding ring, too." Carol caresses the carving of the Cherokee Rose in her cameo.

"Well then _Daryl's_ going to need a ring." Shannon opens the box and points inside it. "You need to mark your territory, or women are going to be all over him like white on rice."

Carol laughs. "I don't think Daryl has that problem."

"Are you _kidding_ me? With those _arms_ and those _skills_? He can fight four men at once, scale and gut a fish like nobody's business, ride a horse, pluck a duck, and you said he's a bow hunter, too? Honey, if you aren't seeing women making eyes at him, then you aren't _looking_."

"Are _you_ making eyes at him?" Carol quips.

"I'm a happily married woman. But I'm not _blind_."

Carol chuckles. Ed used to grow enraged every time another man flirted with her or found her the least bit attractive. Carol can't abide that kind of jealousy anymore, least of all in herself. Instead, she feels proud to know another woman notices the finer qualities of _her_ man. She crouches down to rummage through the piles and piles of rings. "I'm not sure Daryl even _wants_ to wear a ring. None of these scream Daryl to me. Maybe just a simple silver band." She plucks up one, but it's already inscribed with the names Matthew and Rebecca, so she tosses it back.

"He can always tattoo your name on him. Garland did that, in a heart on his shoulder. Unfortunately it's not _my_ name. That was his second fiancé."

Carol smiles. "I'm going to miss you. You're nothing if not entertaining. I wish you could come to our wedding."

"I do, too. But your Kingdom's a long way away, and Garland has a lot of work ahead of him to set this ship straight in this three-month transition period he just…." She flings her hand as if tossing a ball - "threw out there. I don't know if that was the best idea, to be honest. These people aren't accustomed to ruling themselves. I just hope they elect him to lead the Town Council when those three months are up. And I hope we get a decent Town Council to advise him come this Wednesday's election. I'm nominating Dr. Ahmad. I think he'd do a great job."

"I'm sure he would." Carol sweeps some rings to one side of the box to dig further down. "You should run."

Shannon laughs. "I'm more of a behind-the-scenes kind of girl."

Carol looks up from the box. "Listen, this trade fair where we're getting married - the Kingdom holds it _every_ year at the end of May. Maybe you two can come next year, when things are more settled? Send a trade team with you. I know Jamestown is a vibrant community, but, who knows, we may have something to offer you."

"You have your _company_ to offer us, and that's _priceless_. Garland and I will make every effort to be there next year. Maybe we'll bring some Jamestown brew to toast your first year anniversary."

Carol smiles and returns to the box. The rings sift through her fingers like grains of sand on the shore. She fishes out another plain silver band, except, when she gets it up into the light, it's not plain. A black etching runs through the center of the band: an arrow, wrapped nearly al lthe way around, so that the tail almost touches the tip. "I think I've found just the one."

[*]

Because Carol has disappeared somewhere with Shannon, Daryl sticks by Garland's side as he heads back toward the cabin. They pause by a washing trough where the defense attorney is scrubbing his hands after coming out of an outhouse.

"Were all those questions about that whore entertaining me really necessary, James?" Garland asks him.

The defense attorney shakes his hands in the air, and water flings off of them. "Sheriff, you can't ask me to do the dirtiest job in all of Jamestown and then complain about how I do it."

"Fair enough. Though I don't know what you were attempting to do with that line of questioning."

"Well," James says, "I was attempting to impugn your character, of course, but that's rather like attempting to shoot down the sun. Why didn't you consider me for the judge's position?"

"Because you're the defense attorney," Garland tells him.

"I mean going forward. As a permanent position. I'm getting tired of being the bad guy. Ana would make a good defense attorney."

"She'd make an even better judge," Garland tells him. "At any rate, that position will be up to the new Town Council. But feel free to throw your hat in the ring."

"For council? Or for judge?"

"Either-or. Or both. Town Council won't be a full-time job."

The attorney nods and then walks on. Back in the cabin, which is empty of Grandma Bonnie and Gary, Daryl slumps into the arm chair. "Sorry if I was shit on the stand," he mutters.

"You were fine," Garland says as he eases down onto the couch.

It's not long before the women join them, Shannon sitting next to Garland and Carol sitting on the arm of Daryl's chair to show him the ring. "What do you think? Would you wear it? If you don't want to, that's fine with me."

"Don't believe her," Garland says. "It won't be fine."

Daryl chuckles as he takes the ring.

"It will, too," Carol insists. "With me."

Daryl turns the ring over in his fingers. It has an _arrow_ on it. "'S bad ass." He slides it onto his ring finger, but when he turns his hand upside down, it slides off.

Carol slides off the arm of his chair and recovers it from the floor. She slips it into her pocket. "We'll get the blacksmith to resize it when we get home. _If_ you want to wear it."

"Wanna wear it," Daryl says, because he thinks Garland is right, that maybe it does matter to Carol. She's no bullshitter, his woman, but sometimes she doesn't quite know what she wants, or just how much she wants it.

"You were great on that stand today," Garland tells Shannon. "I love you, darling."

Shannon kisses his nose. "I love you, too, baby. So much so I'm not even going to make you go see _Ghost_ with me tonight after all. Carol, you want to join me? I have two tickets."

" _Tickets_?" Carol asks.

"The museum theater only seats fifty, and we're on electricity restrictions, so we have to sell tickets to ration seats. I bought two with two cans of soup. I was going to make Garland take me, but I didn't know y'all would still be here. I say we make it a Girls' Night Out."

"I'm up for it," Carol agrees. "Will there be popcorn?"

"Oh will there ever," Shannon tells her. "With _butter_."

 **[*]**

The jury is ready to issue its verdict in under forty minutes. Back in the court room, Judge Ana Carter orders juror number one to rise. The man speaks with a slight Spanish accent when he reads the paper he unfolds. "We, the jury, on the charge of accessory to the attempted murders of Carol and Shannon, we find the lieutenant _not_ guilty."

Garland shifts uneasily in the pew. Daryl tenses and Carol takes his hand.

"On the charge of murder of the captain, find the lieutenant _not_ guilty."

Daryl's fingers curl tightly through Carol's.

"On the lesser charge of _accessory_ to the murder of the captain, we find the lieutenant _guilty_."

Garland relaxes slightly.

"On the charge of accessory to the murder of the manager, Rodrigo Martinez, we find the lieutenant _guilty_. On the charge of accessory to the murder of Hank Conway, we find the defendant _guilty_. On the charge of accessory to the attempted murder of Sheriff Garland, we find the lieutenant _guilty_. On the charge of conspiracy to commit treason, we find the lieutenant _guilty_. And on the charge of treason," here Garland seems to hold his breath, "we find the lieutenant _guilty_."

Garland lets out a sigh, and Judge Ana asks, "And what is your sentence?"

"We sentence the lieutenant to death by hanging."

Scattered applause erupts from the audience in the church, and the lieutenant's stone face finally gives way to something like fear.

"And your verdict in the charges against Mary Anderson?"

"On the charge of accessory to the murder of Hank Conway, we find the defendant _guilty_."

The whore screams "Nooo!" from her pew, and her attorney silences her.

"On the charge of conspiracy to commit treason, we find the defendant _guilty_."

The whore begins to weep.

"And on the charge of treason, we find the defendant _guilty_."

"And what is your sentence?" the judge asks.

"We sentence the defendant to banishment, to be deposited fifteen miles outside the gates of Jamestown, with weapons, a tent, and three days of rations."

"Nooooooooo!" the whore howls. "That's worse than hanging!"

"What the hell did she think was gonna happen?" Shannon whispers to Carol.

[*]

"Thank God for your fiancé," Garland tells Daryl as he casts his line and it lands with a plop in the James River. A lantern hangs from the posts on either side of them as they fish with poles off a wooden pier, and an empty cooler stands to Daryl's right. "She not only saved my wife's life, but she got me out of going to that damn movie."

"They're gonna come home horny, though, right?" asks Daryl, recalling what the hunters said about the movie. "'Cause of the pottery scene?"

"One can only hope. If not…there's still a little liquor left from the captain's tithe. He was saving it for the whorehut."

Daryl reels in his line, takes off a fish, and tosses it flopping in the cooler before casting again.

"Ya gonna shut that place down now?"

"I'm going to _propose_ the new council do so. Or at the very least regulate it heavily as a public health matter. But that's up to them. If they _do_ shut it down, we'll need to find some use for those remaining women. There are four still living there, plus the madam. The captain was right about one thing. They're not exactly inclined to work in the farm fields or on the docks or in the gardens or in construction. They won't be very productive."

"Childcare?" Daryl suggests.

"You want an alcoholic nymphomaniac caring for your baby?"

Daryl snorts. "Guess not." He looks over his shoulder at the sound of bootsteps and sees Earl approaching.

"Want to fish with us, deputy?" Garland asks.

"I'm on duty."

"Ah, I forgot."

"The whore hanged herself," Earl tells him, "in her cell. With her dress."

Garland's in the middle of reeling in a fish and lets his line go slack. It whirs out. "Jesus."

"It's better than what would have eventually happened to her out there, in all honesty," Earl reasons. "And at least you got to honor your word to take the death penalty off the table."

"I suppose you're right. Have the undertaker bury her in an unmarked grave."

"Yes, Sheriff."

Earl begins to step away when Garland says, "Elections are on Wednesday. I nominated you for Town Council. Your wife, too."

"Ana?"

"Unless you have another wife I don't know about," Garland replies.

"Well, I'm honored, Sheriff, but I'm not sure it's the thing for me. I like my job."

"You would still do your job," Garland reasons. "The Town Council would be a part-time gig."

"I'm not much for making the rules, Sheriff. I'm more for enforcing them. But Ana will likely accept the nomination. She's got a lot of ideas for making the courts more efficient. I got an earful over dinner." Earl nods to Daryl, who has set his pole on a stand for a moment. "I hear you're leaving tomorrow."

"Yeah," Daryl replies "headed home."

"It's a damn shame. We could use another man like you here at Jamestown, now that the captain's gone. You're a fighting machine." Earl holds his hand out. "Thank you for saving Jamestown from tyrants."

Daryl shakes, and the bailiff-deputy tips his hat to him before heading from the docks.

[*]

The girls don't come home horny. They come home gabbing and wanting to play cards. Grandma and Gary are in bed, so Garland cracks out the last of the captain's seized liquor. The little cabin reverberates with laughter as the band of four new friends, who already feel like old friends, drink and tell stories and joke between freshly dealt hands.

"Rummy!" Shannon yells, but Garland's already slapped his hand down over the card before she can. Her hand smacks his.

"Too bad that ain't his ass," Daryl says, and Carol howls with laughter.

"What?" Garland splutters.

"It's an inside joke, baby," Shannon tells him and leans over and kisses his cheek. "Now give me my card."

Garland pulls his hand out from under hers, with the card between his fingers, and extends it toward her.

"And stop looking at my _assets_ while you hand it to me," Shannon insists.

Daryl laughs and takes a swig of moonshine.

Garland flicks the card at his wife. "Well what was I supposed to say on that stand?"

"Titties," Daryl tells him as he sets down the mason jar. "Like a _normal_ red-blooded man."

"Well, I think Garland is quite the gentleman," Carol says.

"Thank you, Carol." Garland turns to his wife, "See, darling. Not _everyone_ thinks I'm a prude."

"But I think you're an _adorable_ prude," Shannon assures him.

"We sure are going to miss you two around here," Garland says.

"I've had a lot of fun with you this week, Carol," Shannon agrees. "And Garland's not used to having a man he can talk to."

"But Daryl doesn't talk much," Carol says.

" _Exactly_ ," Shannon tells her.

"The gates of Jamestown will always be open to both of you," Garland assures them. "If you ever decide to take another road trip."

[*]

Daryl feels like he's just had a missing appendage sewn back on when he finally slings his crossbow over his shoulder. In the museum parking lot, before the iron gates of Jamestown, Garland hands over Freckles's reins. The saddle bags look fuller than Daryl expected. "I gave you back whatever the captain and I took," Garland explains, "less what was already consumed. So mostly it's ammo and batteries and water. But I couldn't unilaterally divest my posse or the community of their share. So it's not much."

"'S fine. Saved the woman who's 'bout to be m' wife. Ya don't owe me nothin'."

"I owe you everything. You saved me. Carol saved Shannon. You both saved Jamestown."

Daryl shrugs. "Didn't do a damn thing you wouldn't of done in the same spot." He holds out his hand, palm open.

Garland grips it hard and shakes.

Shannon hugs Carol. "You take care of yourself," Carol says when she pulls away from the other woman's embrace.

"I'm going to take your advice to heart," Shannon promises Carol. "And toughen up. I'm going to be on our firing range every week. And one of the sailors is going to teach me a little" - She makes karate chopping motions with her hands - "kung fu."

"It's _Taekwondo_ ," Garland corrects her. "Ho-jin's a black belt in Tae-"

"- Baby, let's not get technical."

Carol chuckles. After she mounts her stallion, she waves goodbye one last time. Garland gives the thumbs up to the men at the gates, and they roll them open.

The hooves of the horses clomp across the parking lot, outside the gates, and onto the road that heads north to the Kingdom.


	45. Chapter 45

It's a good thing they didn't wait until the first night of their trip home to consummate their union, because they don't stay someplace romantic. A thunderstorm drives them off the road two hours earlier than they planned to stop. They're soaking wet when they seek refuge in an isolated self-storage facility a good four miles from any other businesses. Carol shoots the lock off of one of the rental units and Daryl rolls the metal door open, finds it completely empty, and they escape, with the horses, inside.

They can't light a fire in here without any ventilation, so they leave a lantern flashlight on, using two of the batteries Garland returned, and they share some room-temperature, canned Jamestown venison stew he also slipped into their saddle bags.

When Carol opens the map to plan tomorrow's route, she finds folded up inside it a page torn from the record of deaths at Jamestown, the one with her ancestor's name on it. "Looks like Garland left me a souvenir." After she folds up and puts away the map, They open up one of the sleeping bags and spread it flat, while keeping the other rolled to use as a pillow, and lie on their backs side by side and look up at the patterns the flashlight paints on the ceiling of the storage unit.

Carol's horse, Lancelot, shits on the cement. They can hear the plop, plop, plop. "It's going to smell lovely in here tonight," Carols says.

There's the crack of lighting and the rumble of thunder across the sky. The metal door of the storage unit rattles. The horses neigh, but soon settle.

"This unit was empty," Carol says, "but they were _all_ locked. None of the other locks were busted off. This facility hasn't been looted yet."

"Might all be empty. Might of just been built when it happened or somethin'."

"Or they might _all_ be full."

"Full of useless shit people can't be bothered to keep in their own damn houses," he says.

"Negative Nelly."

"Didn't say we weren't gonna check every damn one of 'em in the mornin'." He turns his head to her. "Wanna makeout?"

Now Freckles shits on the cement, and Carol purses her lips and says, "Ummm….No."

[*]

They manage to fall asleep to the pitter patter and ping ping ping of the rain, and when they awake and roll up the door, they're greeted by the purpled dawn. It's beautiful, but not nearly as beautiful to Daryl as what he discovers in the first storage unit: eight motorcycles.

"Hellllll yeah!"

"Oh, Pookie, they aren't going to run."

"Course not. But I bet they got some parts I want." He walks over to a series of boxes marked tools. "And I need some good tinkerin' toys."

"First see if there's a good pair of bolt cutters in there so we don't need to shoot off anymore locks. We can't waste bullets."

He finds one, and while he tinkers with the bikes, Carol heads over to the next storage unit. It takes a while to get the lock off, and when she rolls up the door, she's not expecting a pair of walkers to lunge at her. She screams in surprise, jumps back, and slams the first with the bolt cutters and then kicks back the second to give her time to draw her knife before stabbing both.

She's breathing hard when Daryl runs over to her crossbow in hand, poised and ready to shoot. "Ya a'ight?"

"I'm fine." She waves to the fallen walkers.

He lowers his bow with relief. "You were screamin' like a girl."

"I _am_ a girl. And they just _surprised_ me. What are walkers doing in a locked storage unit, anyway?" She glances around inside and sees nothing but a mattress on the floor and two loose handcuffs chained by one cuff to a metal rod attached to the wall.

Her gut churns. Two women were kept prisoner in here, and when their captor didn't return, they must have died – likely from dehydration – and turned. They eventually became desiccated walkers, and their wrists slipped right out of the cuffs. Carol stumbles back. Daryl jumps for the handle of the storage unit and slams the door down.

"Someone did that _before_ all this started," she says.

"Always been monsters. Don't think 'bout it. C'mon." He puts a hand on her back and urges her away.

The next four units are empty. But the fifth is full of books, comic books, CDs, and records. Carol takes ten paperback books for the Kingdom.

"Got room for all that?" Daryl asks.

"I'll just toss them if we find better things."

Daryl snags a handful of comic books for Hershel and Judith and two music records for himself – Led Zeppelin and Supertramp.

" _Supertramp_?" Carol asks. "That's the name of the band?"

"Ya ain't never listened to Supertramp?"

"I'm more of a country fan, myself. You like country?"

"Not unless ya mean Johnny Cash."

In the next unit, there's a large cardboard box marked _Sporting Goods_. Daryl finds three packages of steel bolts for his crossbow, two packages of strings, and a bunch of targets, though he leaves the targets. "And you weren't going to check these units," Carol scolds him.

"Was gonna!" he insists. "Just didn't expect nothin'."

They clear all the units. Daryl salvages a half saddle bag full of motorcycle parts and a few small tools. Carol wipes down the bolt cutters and brings them with her. It's two hours after sunrise when they're back on the road.

[*]

They ride along the overgrown, grassy shoulder of the highway for a half hour, walking the horses slowly, and then veer off into the woods at the sound of trickling water. They find a creek in which to water the horses, and they scoop up and filter some water of their own to refill their canteens. "Hungry?" Daryl asks.

"I could eat."

"Any food left in them bags, or I need to try to hunt somethin'?" He scours the surface of the creek, the bank across from it, and the tree line beyond it. "Could probably get some squirrel."

Even as he says it, Carol's already pulling out a plastic ziplock bag from one of the saddle packs. There's something inside, wrapped in tinfoil.

"Hell's that?"

"No idea." She crouches down, sets the bag on the ground, and pulls out the tinfoil and sets it on the bag and begins to carefully unwrap it.

"Hell yeah!" Daryl exclaims.

There, inside, are two pieces of Grandma Bonnie's strawberry pie.

"For breakfast?" Carol asks. "Why not? We're on vacation."

They wolf down the pie and then Daryl jumps the narrow creek to go up the bank on the other side to take a piss. When he comes back, and is still at the top of the bank, Carol says, "My turn" and takes a running leap over the water. She gets one foot wet and Daryl chuckles.

"Well my legs aren't quite as long as yours."

Daryl looks up from her and across the bank at the sound of neighing. "Aww hell no!"

A man has emerged from somewhere in the woods on the opposite side and mounted Freckles. Daryl swivels his bow off his back and into his hands and lets loose an arrow at the back of his head, but the man ducks, spurs the horse off, and the arrow lodges in a tree. Carol whirls and begins running back through the creek. Daryl jumps down from the bank into the water with a splash. "Hell no!" He outruns Carol, vaults himself onto Lancelot, and spurs the steed in hot pursuit.

Lancelot, with Daryl guiding, crashes through the forest, jumps a fallen tree log and comes out on the highway. Daryl kicks the stallion and gets within a few feet of the fleeing Freckles-thief.

At this speed, Daryl's not going to be able to ride one-handed and aim a bow, so he just pulls up alongside Freckles and kicks his leg out hard. The heel of his boot makes whopping contact with the thief's ribcage, and the man slides to the right. He tries stay on the horse, gripping with his thighs and clinging to the reins, but he ends up toppling over and being dragged a foot before he lets go of the reins and _ooof-ooofs_ in a hard roll on the asphalt.

Daryl rears Lancelot to a stop and whistles for Freckles, who stops fleeing. Daryl whistles again, twice this time, and Freckles turns and walks her way gingerly back. By this time, the thief has pulled himself up into a standing position and is drawing his knife.

Daryl swings his crossbow from his back and aims it down at the thief. "Drop it! Now!"

The knife clatters to the ground and the man raises his hands. "Come on, Daryl. Don't shoot me man."

It's his old banished cellmate, from back in Jamestown, the man who freed his rapist brothers. "Daniel?"

"Hey, man, don't shoot."

Freckles has reached them now and stands facing Daryl, on the other side of Lancelot, blinking lazily.

"Ya tried to steal m'horse!" Daryl growls.

"I didn't know it was yours. I just saw it there, man. I ran out of the rations they gave me when they banished me, and I've scavenged and tried to hunt…but I haven't found any food in over a day. I'm desperate, and I'm hungry."

"You were gonna eat Freckles?" Daryl cries in horror.

"Who's Freckles?" Daniel asks, and then it seems to click with him that Freckles is not a person. He holds out a staying hand. "Oh, no, no. I wasn't going to _eat_ your horse. I was just going to eat whatever was in the saddle bags."

"Ya ain't gettin' Grandma's pie, that's for damn sure."

"I wasn't trying to get Grandma's pie." Daniel gestures helplessly. "Man, I'm just trying to survive! I didn't rape anyone. I didn't kill anyone. I just didn't want my brothers to _die_. And now I'm just trying to survive! I'm out here all alone….and…" He stumbles back, shaking his head. "You know what, man? Just shoot me." He raises his hands out. "Go ahead and shoot me. Before I starve to death or the cannibals get me."

Daryl growls and lowers his crossbow. "C'mere," he tells Freckles and makes a _kiss-kiss_ sound until the horse saunters close. He digs around in one of the saddle bags until he finds something – an MRE. Garland returned both of those. Maybe no one cared for them, given how much real food Jamestown has. He tosses it on the road before Daniel's feet. "Learn to hunt, asshole."

Daniel scoops up the MRE and runs off on foot before Daryl can change his mind. Daryl slides off of Lancelot, and with his crossbow swung again on his back, takes Freckles reins in one hand and Lancelot's in the other, and walks back toward Carol. She's out of the woods by the time he gets there and has started walking up the highway in his direction.

He hands Lancelot over to her. "Is the horse thief dead?" she asks.

"Nah. Gave 'em 'n MRE and sent 'em on his way."

" _Why?_ "

"'Cause a kindness ain't never wasted."

[*]

That night Carol gets her someplace special – a remote bed and breakfast nestled on the Rappahannock River with a wraparound porch, a large wood-burning fireplace in the main room downstairs, and a third-story balcony overlooking the river. Sure it's seen better days. The paint is peeling off in rows, and the downstairs windows are all boarded up. A thick layer of dust coats the furniture inside. But they only have to kill and haul out two walkers – the owners, perhaps, who locked it up tight against the fallen world and then died inside.

They take the boards off one of the windows for some fresh air and so they can hear the horses in the fenced-in backyard. The owners had a dog, judging by the decayed carcass in the corner of the yard. "This place ain't been looted. Dependin' how long into it they died, might have some good shit."

"Kitchen first," Carol says.

They find champagne, three unopened bottles of it, for making mimosas for the breakfast part of the B&B. "These will be great for our wedding," Carol says.

"Ain't gonna be enough for all the people yer gonna invite. We should just drink 'em."

"One tonight," Carol suggests, "one in our bedchamber on our wedding night, and one to share with Shannon and Garland when they come to visit for our first-year anniversary?" Carol doesn't know if they'll ever really make that long trek to the Kingdom for the annual fair, but she hopes so. She'd like to see them again.

Daryl murmurs his agreement, but then says, "Gonna take a while to build the cabin. Where we sleepin' 'till then?"

"In my bedroom, I assumed."

"Nah."

Carol cocks her head and tries to process his objection. "Oh," she says finally. She shared that room with Ezekiel. Daryl was fine sleeping on the couch there when he visited, but he's not going to be fine making love to her under a roof or in a bed she shared with another man. "We can stay in one of the classroom trailers until the cabin is built. We'll throw a mattress on the floor. We have plenty of extras."

[*]

Daryl leaves Carol rummaging through the kitchen, and he goes looking for the shotgun shells for the shotgun they found downstairs. He finds them, eventually, in the library on the second floor, on the bookshelf, neatly stacked at the end of a row of books: eight gloriously full boxes.

When he returns to the kitchen, Carol has found an unopened cannister of salt, assorted herbs and spices, and a bag of unopened sugar. "I also found a box of Twinkies. Those are supposed to last forever, right?"

"Think 's just a myth. Guess we'll find out."

The Twinkies are hard and brittle, but they aren't _spoiled_. They each eat one package and share the one remaining MRE before watching the sunset over the river from the balcony. Carol's cleaned out a couple of champagne flutes and when Daryl pops the cork the horses in the fenced-in yard below whinny.

"To our new adventure," Carol says and raises her flute to his.

He clinks hers and throws it back.

"Slow down and savor it," she tells him. "I think this is expensive stuff."

"How can ya tell?"

"I can't," she admits. "I just prefer to _believe_ it's expensive stuff."

Daryl chuffs and slings an arm around her shoulders, and she leans against him as the last of the sun slips away.

They go back downstairs and Daryl lights the fire while Carol builds their love nest on the floor. They finish off the bottle of champagne, and she's a little buzzed because of the light dinner. She nibbles his ear and pleads, "Make love to me."

"Yer drunk."

"Just a little. But you know I'm willing."

He doesn't need further encouragement. He peels off her clothes and then his own before savoring every inch of her naked body, his fingers trailing like feathers over her flesh, and then his warm lips following the trail left by the heat of his fingers. When he's worked his way down to her knees, he eases her legs apart and then teases the inside of her thigh with gentle nips and sucks. She wraps her legs around his neck and murmurs, "Please, please…" and with one hand guides his head where she wants it.

He raises his head enough to see her eyes. "Ain't done this much," he admits. "So talk to me." He lowers his head again, inhales her scent, and makes one tentative lick, which sends her jerking upward.

"Ohhhh," she breathes. "That's right."

"Yeah?" His tongue flicks back and she digs her fingers into his hair.

He explores her cautiously at first.

"Suck a little," she demands after a while, and he does. She gasps, and he sucks harder. "Oh! Lighter…gentler…not so rough…mhmmm….yeah…like that….just like that…oh, God! Daryl!" Her hips jerk up again. "Oh God yes…please…please…please…." Her hands rake through his hair while she falls silent except for a hum of pleasure as she circles her hips.

He stills entirely for a moment and stops tasting her just to hear her beg for more. Her voice crying, "Please...please...please..." is like a drug to him, and he relents and flicks his tongue out again. This time, he doesn't let up.

Later, when she's shuddering from her orgasm, he breaks free of her grip on his hair, licks his way up over her belly to her breasts, and suckles first one nipple and then the other. Breathing hungrily, he pushes himself up by his arms over her as he pushes himself inside.

She gasp when he drives all the way in, and he groans. "Aw fuck ya feel good," he tells her before he begins to rock.

Carol closes her eyes, and it's as if there's a rainbow of colors swarming behind her eyelids. He bends his head as he begins to thrust, a low, pleasure-seeking growl sounding in his throat. He slows and then speeds up and then slows again…taking his time…trying to bring her to a second peak. Eventually, he does, and they both come crashing over the other side together, Daryl grunting out her name, and Carol singing his.


	46. Chapter 46

Iron horse shoes clatter over the disintegrating asphalt of the strip mall parking lot. Daryl peers through the smashed windows of the thoroughly emptied liquor store and moves on. Carol draws up beside him on her horse as they pass the pawn shop. The glass gun case inside has been smattered to shards and emptied. Next they ride by a bail bonds office, which is still intact, but three walkers can be seen bumbling around inside.

"An area like this?" Carol says. "I bet there's a Planned Parenthood."

"Ya want a pamphlet or somethin'?" Daryl asks.

Carol rolls her eyes. "It's a _clinic_. It might still have something useful." They've learned they can push expiration dates on many pills for years.

"Doubt that, the way all this other shit's been looted."

"Maybe no one thought of it, because they were so busy getting drunk and grabbing guns."

Daryl glances at the tinted windows of _Lacy's Massage Parlor_ as they ride past. "Looks like the kind of place with happy endin's."

"What do you know about it?" she teases.

"Nothin'," he says defensively. "Ain't Merle. Never went to a whore." He's uneasy after he says it, and admits what he wouldn't tell her in that game of truth and drink back at the house in Dumfries: "'Cept…once, maybe. Had sex with this woman. Turned out Merle paid 'er to pop m'cherry. But I didn't know." He looks at her out of the corner of his eye, enough to see that she isn't shocked. There's something more like sympathy on her face.

"And after that?" she asks.

"After that…'s mostly sisters or friends or cousins of Merle's girlfriends. They all wanted booze or drugs. But they also liked the fuckin'."

"I'm sure they did," Carol says. " _I_ like the fucking."

"Pffft."

"Don't _pfft_ me," she says. "You _know_ I like what we've been doing."

"Yeah, but we ain't been fuckin'. We been makin' love."

She smiles. It's that sweet, pretty smile that always makes his heart feel like it just stopped beating for a second.

They ride past a cleaned-out convenience store inhabited by a walker that seems to be missing the lower half of its body. It tries to crawl toward them using only its arms. They leave it be.

"How many women?" she asks.

"Ain't got the clap or nothin'."

"I assumed you would have told me if you did." Carol rests her hands on the horn of her saddle as they ride past a hole-in-the-wall bar with every window shattered and the bodies of six dead walkers, slain by whoever looted the place. "What about since we met?"

"Whattabout it?"

"Have you had sex with anyone since we met?" she asks. "Anyone from the Hilltop? Or any of the other allied camps?"

"Does it matter? _You_ have." He doesn't mean to growl those last two words, but he does.

"No, it doesn't matter," she says gently. "But it's probably something we should discuss."

"Why?"

"Because," she says simply.

"Ya really wanna know?"

"Yes."

The horses clomp-clomp-clomp past a storefront advertising palm and tarot card readings. "For six of the last seven years," he tells her, "I've had an exclusive relationship with m'left hand."

Carol laughs. But then her lips settle into a firm, straight line. "And the other year?"

"That was the year after ya married 'Zeke." Daryl looks away from her as if scanning the parking lot for threats.

"And?"

"And I fucked every woman who was willin'." When he dares to turn his eyes back, Carol is shifting uncomfortably in her saddle. "Ya asked," he says.

"And you answered," she replies dully. "I just…I'm surprised."

"Why?"

"Because I've never seen you come onto a woman before."

"Never have when ya've been 'round. Never _wanted_ to, I guess, long as I thought there was a chance. But when ya actually _married_ 'em…" He looks away.

"Just for a year?" she asks. "Why'd you stop after that?"

"'Cause it didn't help."

They pass an auto parts store, but it looks empty, except for some tires they can't transport and a few bottles of windshield wiper fluid.

"How many women did you sleep with that year?" she asks.

"Didn't _sleep_ with any of 'em."

"You know what I meant. How many?"

"Ya really wanna know?"

They're riding past a thrift store now and Carol slows to a stop to peer inside. The windows have all been busted in, and what little junk remains looks dusty and useless. He thinks maybe she's gotten distracted and he's off the hook, but then she says, "I want to know if there was anyone I know."

He avoids the question, for the moment, with another question. "Who do ya know?"

"Michonne."

"'Chonne never got over Rick."

"Tara."

"Tara ain't fuckin' _no_ man."

"Rosita."

"She was with Siddiq half that year. Gabe the other half. So…no."

Carol clucks to Lancelot to lead the horse onward again. "Enid."

"Jesus Christ!" he calls as her horse walks off. "She's less'n half m'age!" Daryl gives Freckles a gentle kick to catch up with Carol.

"I was just listing women I know. And she was twenty when I married Ezekiel. Maggie?"

Maggie was still alive back then. "Nah. Wouldn't do that to Glenn."

"She loved Glenn deeply," Carol reasons, "but after a while, it would have been normal for her to want – "

"- Meant _I'd_ never do that to Glenn."

"Oh." The horses clomp past a lawyer's office. "Cyndie?" By the way her voice goes up, he thinks she'd be hurt if he said yes, so he's glad he can honestly say no.

"Ain't nobody ya much know, probably. Knew what I was doin', 'n why, even if I didn't tell myself I knew." Daryl steers his horse around a dead walker in the parking lot and then back to Carol. "Wasn't gonna fuck anyone I respected, anyone I might let down. So…looked for the ones who just wanted a quick screw. 'S all they wanted – just to be fucked a couple times by the loner bad boy. Ain't like they wanted to get to know _me_."

"How many?" Carol asks.

She's not going to let up on that one, is she? "Six," he answers.

"That's it!" she cries. "You made me think you'd been up and down and all around the block!"

"Hey," Daryl says defensively, "'s a lot! 'S like ten percent of all the single adult women."

Carol shakes her head and pulls Lancelot to a stop. "I hope none of them are coming to the fair," she says as she dismounts.

Daryl slides off Freckles. "Three of 'em're married now, if that helps."

"It doesn't."

"Three're dead. If that's better."

"Well I don't wish anyone _dead._ Was it that flu?"

"Two of 'em, yeah. The other one got bit." He looks at the building in front of them. There it is, Planned Parenthood, all locked up, door shut, windows un-smashed, the name etched in fading blue-and-white letters on the glass.

Carol strides to the window to the left of the solid wooden door and pounds on it hard with her fist, more times than she needs to in order to check for walkers. Then she puts her hand at her forehead and peers inside. She rears back.

"How many?" Daryl asks.

"Five I can see, at this window."

"Keep knockin'." He walks over to the window on the other side of the door and pounds on that one. They both pound for a minute and stop. "How many ya still got?"

"Six now."

"I got four."

The sound of thudding comes from behind the door. "And there's more behind the door," Carol says. "I think we're talking at least fifteen."

"Ain't worth it," he says.

"Isn't it though? A clinic, that hasn't been looted?"

He thinks maybe, after hearing about the women he's fucked, she just wants to kill something. And it's probably for the best that something isn't him. But fifteen, with only one door to funnel through? And the horses out here? If even one makes it past them and takes a single bite…there goes their most valuable asset. "How?" he asks.

Carol looks around, finds a loose brick, and holds it up. "We could smash one of the windows. They won't be able to crawl through all at once. Then we pick them off one or two at a time as they try to pile through."

"Liable to get bit smashing it."

"We throw from a distance."

"Mhm," Daryl agrees, "but lets get the horses back." He leads them away from the door, to the other side of the lot, and ties them to the hitch of a pickup after scanning in all directions for walkers.

He comes back and watches Carol chuck the brick against the window. It bounces off and clatters to the asphalt. "A'ight, Babe Ruth," he tells her, "m'turn."

He winds up the brick and chucks it hard. Again, it just bounces off the window, but this time, at least, there's a crack in the glass.

Carol takes the brick and chucks it, and two more cracks spider through the glass, but the window holds.

Daryl scoops up the brick. She holds out her hand for it and says, "No, I weakened it for you. You're not going to get the credit. I bet you were that kid at the birthday party who always wanted the last whack at the pinata."

He hands over the brick warily. "Ain't never been to a birthday party with no damn pinata. 'S for rich kids."

"I was _hardly_ a rich kid," she replies. "But my mom used to make one using paper machae. And she'd fill it with all those cheap hard candies."

"Peppermints?" he asks.

"And butterscotch."

Daryl licks his lips.

"I don't guess you ever had a birthday party?"

"Nah. Went to my cousin's birthday party once, though, when I's eight. 'Bout Easter time. My mama drove me across two towns to take me there. M'aunt, she hired a clown 'n everythin'. 'Course, clown was drunk of his damn ass. Took a piss in the sandbox where my aunt'd buried all these eggs with tootsie rolls in 'em for the kids to find. 'N then no one wanted to dig 'n find 'em. 'Cept me. I found 'em all."

Carol chuckles.

"Wasn't invited back the next year," he continues. "Or maybe I was 'n my daddy didn't tell me, since my mama was dead." He nods to the brick. "Go for it."

Carol winds up her arm to pitch the brick. This time, the glass shatters and rains down inside the clinic and outside on the parking lot.

Daryl raises his bow and shoots the first walker to try to crawl out. While he reloads, Carol strides forward and knifes a second walker, and then runs backward as Daryl shoots a third. She jogs up and knifes a fourth as Daryl reloads. A walker seizes her arm, and she swings herself sideways, her arm still in its walker's grip, to give Daryl a clear shot at its head, which he takes. The dead hand slackens, and she swings back to stab a sixth walker. They're piling up fast now and getting too grabby, so she runs back to the horse and draws her rifle out from behind the saddle pack.

When she gets back, Daryl's struggling to reload, and one walker has crawled all the way out into the parking lot and is lurching toward them. She picks it off, as well as another that is hanging half out the window, and then four more that are clawing near its sides. She runs up and shoots through the window, straight, left right, straight until she thinks she's picked them all off. "I need some light!" she calls

Daryl steps over the bodies to shine a flashlight into the darkened clinic, sweeping it every which way. There's only two left, and with a pew-pew from her rifle, they're down.

Carol goes back to the saddle bags for a shirt to wrap around her arm for brushing away the glass, and, eventually, both crawl inside.

When they come out with plastic bags full of antibiotics and other medicines, there are couple dozen walkers lurching from across the street toward the frightened horses. The gunshots must have drawn them out of the woods on the other side. They shove the medicines hurriedly in the saddle bags, untie the horses, and ride off quickly, leaving the grasping walkers in their wake.

[*]

"That felt good," Carol admits when they slow to a walk a mile later. "I haven't really _shot_ in a while, with ammunition being as limited as it is."

"Think ya used up half of what Garland left us."

"Hardly. And you found all those shotgun shells. And, who knows? We could get lucky on the road."

Daryl grins. "As lucky as I got last night?"

Carol smiles, shakes her head, and spurs her stallion onward.


	47. Chapter 47

Carol does find four more boxes of ammunition that day, in a little, two-bedroom brick house they decide to hole up in overnight, in a shoebox in the walk-in closet along with a few dozen loose photographs. The owners who fled at the start probably forgot they'd kept it in there. She scavenges the entire house while Daryl's out hunting their supper, and finds an untouched nursery, which looks like it was put together in expectation of a baby that was never born.

The formula would have been a godsend the first one to three years, but it's not safe to risk feeding a baby now. She takes instead a package of cloth diapers and pins and two pacifiers still in the plastic wrapping. Nabila is due to have her third in three months, and she'll likely appreciate the gift. Carol also looks in the drawers and picks out two cute winter three-to-six-month onesies. Beneath one of the piles of clothes, she finds a half-finished bottle of whiskey. She's guessing it wasn't for teething.

She holds the bottle up later when Daryl comes through the kitchen door, an already skinned rabbit slung over his shoulder. "Somebody had a drinking problem he hid from his wife," she tells him.

"Ain't mine."

She clonks it down on the table. "I didn't mean you, silly. And I'm not your wife. _Yet_." She smiles. "But I'm looking forward to being Mrs. Dixon."

"Yeah? Ya want that name?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

He shrugs. "I never wanted it. Just meant ya was from a shit family."

"Well that's not what it means now, does it?"

He nods to the bottle. "Any good?"

"How would I know? All whiskey tastes awful to me."

Daryl walks over, tosses the rabbit on the counter, and pops the top off the whiskey bottle before taking a swig. He swishes it around in his mouth and swallows. "Drinkable," he declares.

"Whiskey rabbit stew?" she asks.

"That a thing?"

"It _could_ be. I don't have much else to make broth with, and you don't need to be getting drunk tonight."

"A'ight." He sets the bottle back down on the counter. "Then have at it, chef lady."

The stew turns out better than she expected, with the help of some of the salt, herbs, and spices she picked up from the bed and breakfast yesterday, and with the dandelion greens she yanks up from the front yard and throws in to complement the meat. It must be better than Daryl expects, too, because he grunts, "Damn good!" twice while he eats.

They stable the horses in the largely empty, one-car garage, to keep them safe from walkers. They don't bother to light a fire tonight – there's no reason to risk attention-drawing smoke when it's not cold, and the evening weather has warmed a good ten degrees since yesterday. It's still cool, but it's warm enough pressed together in their love nest, in the afterglow of sex.

Carol slides her fingers into the hair on Daryl's chest and tugs lazily on it while he fades in and out of sleep. "I love making love," she says, "but I bet I'd like fucking, too."

"What?" he murmurs and opens one eye.

"We can do both, if you want. The fucking and the making love. Just not both at the same time, probably."

He closes his eye and makes a doubtful noise.

"I'm hardly a delicate flower, Daryl."

He opens both eyes sleepily. "Wanna fuck now?"

"No," she admits. "Not right now."

"In the mornin'?"

"Probably not in the morning either."

"Pfft." He closes his eyes.

"But _sometime_. When the time is right. I really would be fine with it."

"Mhmhm."

She settles her head onto his shoulder. "You don't know me."

"Keep tellin' yerself that."

 **[*]**

The next morning they do have sex, but slowly and lazily, waking each other's bodies with the sun.

"I think we're doing this backward," Carol tells him afterward as she snuggles in. "We're having our honeymoon before our wedding."

"Always did like dessert before dinner," he mumbles.

She tolls onto her back. With her head on his shoulder, she says, "You can fuck me, you know, if you want, however you want. I wasn't joking about that. I don't what you to get bored."

"Get bored? Hell ya talkin' 'bout?"

She pulls the sleeping bag they're using as a cover up to her neck. "I know I'm a little shy about sex. A little…conventional. I take a lot of warming up. And all those women you were with…I don't want you to get bored."

"Ain't nothin' borin' 'bout you," he insists. "Hell, Carol, I ain't never had sex like this before. Didn't even know I _could_."

She rolls to her side to face him. "What do you mean?"

"Mean…never been completely naked with a woman before."

"Do you mean that literally or figuratively?" she asks.

"Both I guess. Always left m'clothes mostly on, 'cept what needed to come down. Never wanted to show a woman m'scars before. Never looked a woman in the eyes durin'. Never _felt_ anythin'. Mean, got off, but I never _felt_ a damn thing. 'S never been anythin' but scratchin' an itch before. What we been doin'," he assures her, "ain't nothin' borin' 'bout it."

She snuggles against his side. "The first woman you've _ever_ been naked with?"

"Mhmhm."

"You're the first man who ever brought me to orgasm. I mean, a _real_ orgasm. I thought I'd had orgasms before…but I guess I hadn't."

His finger slides gently up her spine under the heavy blanket of the sleeping bag. "Yer the first woman I ever went down on."

"What?" She has to look up for a moment to see if he's joking. He said he didn't have much experience at it . He didn't say he had _none_. There's no twinkle of a joke in his eyes, though. She lowers her head to his shoulder again. "But you were pretty good at it."

"'Cause yer a damn good teacher."

"You're the first man who ever brought me a flower."

"Can't be."

"You are. The first _man_. I'm not counting my prom date. Ed never did."

"Well, yer the first woman I ever brought a flower to. So damn nervous when I brought that thing in the trailer, too. Just wanted to give ya some hope. Thought, hell, maybe this'll make her stop cryin' for a minute. But it _made_ ya cry."

"Because it was beautiful. Because the story was beautiful. Because the thought was beautiful. Because what you tried to do for my little girl – it was beautiful." She traces the muscles of his left shoulder with her forefinger. She tries to think of another one. "You're the first man who ever caught and cooked a snake for me."

"Yer the first woman, ever made me muffins."

"No," she insists. "Surely you're mother made you muffins."

"My mama wasn't 'zactly Betty Crocker."

"You're the first man who ever took me on a motorcycle ride. I think I was more scared of that bike than of the walkers chasing us."

"Pffft." His hand slides from her bare ass, where it's settled, upward over her back. "You're the first woman ever said ya loved me. _Not_ countin' my mamma."

Carol's relieved his mother at least told him that. "You're the first man I've ever been in love with."

His hand freezes between her shoulder blades. "Whattabout 'Zeke?"

"I loved him. But I wasn't _in love_ with him. I think I just wanted some semblance of normalcy. A family for Henry, while he was still young. A husband who treated me like a queen, instead of the way Ed did. I wanted to try to forget all the horrors of the past, and I couldn't do that in Alexandria or the Hilltop, with all those ghosts and friends of ghosts walking around. I wanted the fantasy of domestic happiness, the whole storybook thing. And it was a storybook. It wasn't _real_. But I believed it for a while. If he hadn't died, though, I don't know if our marriage would have lasted another year. It's a terrible, terrible thing to say, but I'm just glad Henry didn't ever have to see us split up. I feel guilty about that marriage. Like I _used_ Ezekiel."

"Didn't use 'em," Daryl says. "Gave 'em 'zactly what he wanted, which was you. He had ya for three years. Man loves ya…he'd be happy with that. Hell, he'd take three months with ya. Three weeks. Three days. He'd take three minutes, and he'd be grateful he got 'em."

"I'm sorry I hurt you. I didn't mean to. I had no idea marrying Ezekiel would hurt you that badly. You said you were happy for me."

"Hell else was I s'posed to say? 'N I was. 'Cause ya seemed happier then I'd seen ya…since…well. Since the prison."

"Why didn't you say anything?" she asks. "If you loved me…why didn't you just _say_ so?"

His hand slides to settle at the small of her back. "By the time I knew I did… thought it was too late."

"When did you know?"

"When ya told me you were gonna marry 'em. Somethin'…snapped inside me."

Carol lifts her head and half sits up to look down at him.

"'S when I knew for _sure_ ," he continues. "Had an inkling 'fore then. Guess maybe I kind of felt it as far back as the farm. Just didn't know what love was 'fore I met ya, so…didn't know what any of that shit I was feelin' all those years was."

She strokes his cheek with the back of her hand. "I love you, Daryl. So very much." She bends to kiss him gently.

When she pulls away, his eyes flit down, the way they do sometimes when he's overcome with some emotion and it's too much. It's just too much. "Better pack up," he mutters. "Get movin'."

[*]

Carol is bent over her backpack, which rests in the armchair, to slip in her sweat pants inside, when she feels a sudden, sharp prick in the seat of her pants. "Ow!" she stands and whirls around to find Daryl standing by the couch and chortling like a schoolboy. He's too far away to have actually touched her. He's all the way on the other side of the room. "What did you just do?"

"That hurt?" he asks. "Didn't think it would."

She swats at the back of her pants and plucks something out of them. It's a tooth pick. And there's something tiny and silver in his hand. "What the hell is that?" she asks.

"'S a baby crossbow. Made of out metal or some shit. Found it on the bookshelf. Ya can shoot _toothpicks_ with it." He reaches over to the end table, where a small cylindrical canister of toothpicks sits, and fishes one out and loads the miniature, doll-sized crossbow.

"Oh no you don't," she tells him, and runs across the room to swipe it from his hand, but he swirls to evade her. She chases him around the room until he hits his knee on the coffee table, curses, and drops the tiny bow to clutch his knee.

She scoops it up quickly, pulls back the trigger that is smaller than her fingertip, and shoots him right in the ass. "Didn't even feel it!" he yells.

"Well it didn't go through your pants."

He swipes the tooth pick out of the back of his pants. "Give it here."

"No."

"Ain't gonna shoot ya again," he promises. "Just wanna keep it."

She shakes her head, but she hands the bow over to him. He screws the lid back onto the toothpicks and packs that in his backpack too.

"I guess it will come in handy if we encounter a walker that's been through a shrink ray, huh?" she teases

"Gonna give it to Hershel!" he insists. "To shoot his toy soldiers with."

[*]

That afternoon, they pause in their travels to loot a small, local coffee shop. The front is cleared out, but no one busted into the storage room. It's mostly full of napkins and paper towels, toilet paper and cleaning supplies, but there are also several extra boxes containing one-cup servings of instant coffee powder back there. "Fancy shit," Daryl mutters. "Don't taste no better than Folgers 'n they charge three times as much."

"It tastes better than Folgers," she assures him.

They decide to use their camp stove to heat up some water and have a cup of coffee in the middle of the day, at one of the two-people tables, in the midst of the tsunami of napkins and stirring straws and coffee cups that line the floor. They also eat the last two pieces of Grandma Bonnie's strawberry pie – Garland snuck four total in the saddle bags.

"A'ight, yer right," he admits. "Tastes a hell of a lot better 'n Folgers crystals."

"I always wanted to go on a coffee date." Carol smiles at Daryl over the curling steam that drifts from her cup.

"'S somethin' rich people used to do."

"You think _everything_ is something rich people used to do."

"Guess I was just that poor." He slurps his coffee. "Sometimes, we'd go weeks without power. The water'd be turned off."

"You know, they had programs for people who can't pay their utilities. I know. My mom used to use them sometimes."

"Yeah, well, sounds like yer mom was a responsible human being."

"She tried," Carol says. "But it wasn't easy, after my dad died, raising us alone."

" _Us_?" Daryl asks.

"I had a sister."

"How come ya ain't never mentioned her?"

"We don't even talk about the people we lost at the start of the Outbreak, most of us," Carol says. "And I lost her long before that, when I was twelve. Car accident. She was three years older, and was with these teenage boys who had been drinking."

"Sorry 'bout your sister. Had one, too."

"What? I thought it was just you and Merle."

Daryl leans forward with his elbows on the table. "Merle was in juvie when she was born. I was seven. By then, my mama, she really liked her wine…so the baby, poor thing, had, uh…'s called?"

"Fetal alcohol syndrome?"

"Mhmhm. Cried a lot. So my daddy', he took off for a bit after she was born. Couldn't stand the cryin'. 'N my mama, she'd sort of take care of her, but then drink and pass out. Me, I thought…hell 'm gonna get to be the big brother for a change. 'N I ain't gonna be like Merle. Gonna build 'er up, ya know. Not tear 'er down. Gonna protect 'er. So I'd feed, 'er. Change 'er, when the diaper got bad eough. Ain't right. Seven-year-old kid takin' care of a baby. But I did."

"Is that why you took to Judith so easily? Beth said you gave her her first bottle."

"Maybe. M'sister, though…didn't last two months. Slept all night one night ,'n I thought damn. She's getting better. Ain't cryin' so much. Gettin' stronger. Didn't know they wasn't s'posed to sleep all through the night at that age. 'N then she just didn't wake up the next mornin'. Undertaker called the police. Routine, I guess, when a baby dies. Police investigated. They called it SITS or some shit."

"SIDS."

"Yeah." He lets out a shaky sigh and then sips some more coffee. "Called CPS when they saw the trash heape we lived in, though, 'n all the bottles. 'N CPS took me for a few weeks, but my mamma got me back somehow."

"What was foster care like?" Carol asks.

"Same shit, diff'rn channel. 'S glad to go home. My daddy wasn't beatin' me yet, though. That didn't start 'til my mama died in the fire the next year. Guess he took a couple years off 'tween me 'n Merle."

"What was her name? Your sister?"

"Didn't have one. Baby certificate just said Baby Girl Dixon. My mama was gonna come up with a name, file for it later. Never did. So 's what I called her. Baby girl."

Carol reaches out across the table and covers his hand with hers and squeezes.

With his free hand, he lifts his cup and slams the rest of his coffee. "'S hit the road."


	48. Chapter 48

Carol trails her fingertips across Daryl's arm as she draws away from their parting kiss. They've reached the fork in the road that leads west to the Hilltop and north to the Kingdom. Daryl has to return Freckles, who belongs to the Hilltop. Then he'll spend some time with Hershel, hunt to fill the Hilltop's smokehouse as a parting gift, say his goodbyes, gather Dog and his things, and return to the Kingdom in a few weeks for the late spring fair, where he'll take Carol as his bride.

He thinks about that as he rides alone along the shoulder of the highway, where the asphalt crumbles. He wonders if he'll make a decent husband, if he'll be what Carol wants him to be, if she'll want more than he can give her. He only knows he wants her, and that however badly his parents failed at their own marriage, he's going to do better.

Once he's on the dirt path leading to the gates of the Hilltop, he dismounts and takes Freckles by the reins. Jesus and Tara wave to him from atop the fence, and then Tara whistles down. The gates roll open. Aaron strolls out, smiling. He moved here a year ago to be with Jesus, and now he's part of the reluctant triumvirate that runs the place. Daryl embraces him, slaps his back, and steps away.

"We were getting worried," Aaron says. "We got word you'd gone on a road trip, but we expected you back by now. Tara was just getting ready to send a rider to the Kingdom to check if Carol had returned. How was your…" Aaron smiles, " _vacation_?"

Walking beside Freckles, Daryl follows Aaron inside and briefly recounts the adventure at Jamestown. They come to a stop before the mansion, and Daryl tells Aaron he's marrying Carol and moving to the Kingdom.

Aaron sighs. "We all assumed it would happen one day."

"Ya did?" Daryl never assumed any such thing.

"We're going to hate to lose you, but I'm happy for you, Daryl. I really am."

Dog comes bounding out of the barn and leaps up, barking, to put his front paws on Daryl's chest. Daryl lowers his head to accept his friend's wet-tongued kiss. "Down, boy!" he growls at last, and Dog yips and falls to all fours. "Leg's lookin' better."

"All healed up," Aaron replies. "You were gone awhile. The smokehouse is getting a little light."

"Gonna hunt a few weeks. Get y'all some deer to fill it 'fore I go. But the other hunters are gonna have to pick up my slack when 'm gone. "

Hershel comes running out of the Hilltop's schoolhouse yelling "Uncle Daryl! Uncle Daryl!" Daryl scoops him up into a bear hug. The boy squirms sideways in his arms, sees the horse, and shouts happily, "Freckles is okay!" Daryl sets Hershel on his feet to go pet the horse he named.

Enid comes down the mansion steps next, greets Daryl with a hug, and then takes Hershel's hand and the reins of Freckles. She leads the horse and the boy to the stables. Daryl watches them leave, and murmurs to Aaron, "Ain't gonna be easy tellin' the boy."

"He _misses_ you when you're gone," Aaron replies, "but he's also _used_ to you being gone for days at a time. You aren't exactly a homebody. And he's got Enid. Tara. Me. Jesus. Everyone. He'll be fine. And you'll visit, won't you?"

"Mhm. Gonna join the trade team," Daryl assures him with a hand clasped down on his shoulder.

[*]

Ten miles outside the Kingdom, Carol hears the sound of horse hooves and buries herself in the brush to peer through binoculars. On the road beyond the trees, Dianne rides by, a quiver on her back, and slows her horse to a stroll. Behind her follow three knights of the Kingdom, looking left and then right, and on the heels of their horses, two dogs. One of the knights shouts something to the dogs, which put their snouts to the ground and begin sniffing toward the tree line.

Smiling, Carol emerges. Swords are drawn and arrows pointed in her direction, but only for a moment before they're lowered. Dianne slides from her horse and saunters over, smiling as much as the woman ever does smile, and nods to her queen. "I told them there was no way you weren't coming back alive."

"But you sent out a search party?" Carol asks.

"Jerry insisted. We expected you back by now."

"We ran into a delay," Carol tells her. "And were guests of another camp for a week."

"Guests?"

"Well…at first we were prisoners. Then we were guests."

Dianne smirks. "This sounds like quite the story." As they ride back to the Kingdom, Carol describes their adventure.

Dianne never notices her ring, but Jerry does, after she enters the gates, and she pulls away from his happy embrace. The big man points at the cameo, grinning. "Is that what I think it is? Did Daryl finally pop the question?"

Carol toys with the ring. "What do you mean? You were _expecting_ him to?"

Nabila, who has drawn up beside Jerry with a toddler on her hip, says, "Daryl's been visiting you almost every week for months. He stays in your bedchamber. Yes, we all assumed he'd ask eventually."

"He slept on my _couch_ ," Carol clarifies. "Did you all think that this whole time…"

Jerry and Nabila exchange glances and smiles.

Carol laughs. "Well, yes, he did pop the question. We're getting married at the fair. Nothing big!" she warns Jerry. "No major pomp and circumstance. But I'd love for you both to be there."

"We wouldn't miss it for the world," Nabila assures her.

"So…" Jerry asks. "Is he going to be King Daryl now?"

"I wouldn't try calling him that, if I were you," Carol warns.

 **[*]**

Daryl straps Dog to his chest and saddles his motorcycle. As a parting gift from the Hilltop, he has just enough ethanol to make it to the Kingdom.

The Kingdom doesn't grow corn, and even if it did they might not want to spare any of it for fuel, so he'll have to get some from the Hilltop next time he comes to trade. But he's not leaving without his bike, even if it's a bike he can only tinker with.

For now, though, he enjoys the wind in his hair, the feel of the steel horse between his legs, the smell of the fumes, the roar of the engine as he glides down the highway with his canine companion.

This is the only bachelor party he wants or would ever ask for.

Who knows when he'll ride again.

[*]

Daryl can't wait until this wedding is over.

His dress shirt feels weirdly stiff and there's not enough room for his balls to breathe properly in these ridiculous khakis. He doesn't like all these people staring at him as he stands under this dumbass arch covered in flowers. The Kingdom's musicians strike up the wedding march on violin, and Judith skips down between the two columns of folding chairs tossing petals. That makes him forget his misery for a minute, because that girl is about the cutest damn child he's ever seen.

But then Carol rounds the back of the chairs and begins her march toward him. She's only wearing a simple spring dress – white with flowers – but he's never seen her in a dress before. Goddamn she's beautiful. He rocks back on his heels for a moment and then plants them forward. When she's standing across from him, he feels like he's underwater. He takes in a deep breath and blows it out, and she smiles.

Two rings rest in the crevice of the open pages of Father Gabriel's Bible – the Cherokee rose cameo and the silver band with arrow – both of which have been resized by the Kingdom's blacksmith to better fit.

Daryl repeats the words Father Gabriel tells him to say. His hand isn't entirely steady when he slips the ring onto Carol's finger, and neither is his heart when he's told, "You may kiss your bride."

[*]

In the receiving line that follows, Daryl's eyes keep raking over Carol. "You like my dress?" she asks with a teasing smile.

"Mhmhm."

Carol hugs Michonne and then taps the nose of RJ, who rides Michonne's hip. Judith files by next and tips her father's old hat up when she looks up at the couple. "It's about time," she says, and Daryl chuffs and knocks her hat down over her eyes.

Henry walks by next and holds out an open hand to Daryl, who shakes. "I decided to follow your example," he says, and nods to Rachel from Oceanside, who stands next to him.

Carol gasps at the ring on her finger. "You're much too young!" she says.

" _Relax_. We're waiting until I turn eighteen, Mom," he assures her. "It's just an _engagement_ for now." He's taller than Carol now, and he bends a little when he hugs her. "Congratulations. I'm happy for you, Mom."

Carol smiles, relieved that Henry doesn't seem to feel like she's trying to replace his adoptive father by marrying Daryl. Sometime in the last few weeks at Oceanside, the boy became a man. She congratulates Rachel, too. The girl is a little hard-around-the-edges for an idealist like Henry, Carol thinks, but maybe that's just what he needs to balance him.

The newlyweds get a lot of hugs as Eugene, Jesus, Aaron, Tara, Jerry, Dianne, Nabila, Rosita, Siddiq, and Enid file by to say their congratulations. When the line peters out, Daryl's eyes dip down again at the cotton dress clinging to her breasts, and he murmurs, "Can we go now?"

 **[*]**

The sounds of the fair die away as Daryl and Carol hurry up the ramp of their temporary classroom trailer. His mouth ravishing her lips, he backs her inside the trailer and kicks the door shut behind himself. When he pushes her against the metal teacher's desk, she tears at the buttons on his shirt. It doesn't matter that she pops three off in her hurry to undress him. She knows he'll never wear this stiff dress shirt again.

Daryl rips his mouth from her lips and steps back to yank his now half-unbuttoned shirt over his head, and with it the undershirt beneath. The muscles of his arms and chest ripple as he tosses the clothing roughly aside. He quickly undoes his belt, and the buckle clangs with the force of his undressing. When he drops his pants and kicks them back, he stands before her naked and unashamed.

Carol drags her eyes from the stern line of his jaw over his muscular chest and down. Still looking at his awaiting erection, she reaches under the hem of her spring dress to slide off her panties. She steps out of them and kicks them aside. But when she begins to lift the dress to pull it off and match his nakedness, he gruffly orders, "Nah-uh. Leave it on."

Carol lets go of the hem, and the white floral dress falls back to just above her knees. Daryl lifts her onto the metal teacher's desk, slides a hand up over her bare leg to her knee, and then spreads her legs open, stretching the material of the dress, before he leans in to possess her lips again. Kissing her hungrily, he yanks her to the edge of the desk and drives himself inside.

The desk's metal filing cabinet drawer, which was partially open, rolls shut with a metallic clang. It's not long before the whole desk is shaking from the strength of their hungry thrusting. Carol moans with abandon, and Daryl's animalist grunts fill the trailer. The sound is all in his throat, and that rough rumble makes Carol even more excited.

He pulls partway out, and his lips open to form a single word - " _Mine_ " - before he drives into her again, hitting a spot she'd always believed was only myth. Carol cries out his name, so loud she's sure they must hear it all the way back at the fair, and then he does it again, growling, " _Mine_."

Tonight he's claiming her as his own, and tonight she lets him. "Yes!" she shouts.

" _Mine. Mine. Miiiiiine!_ "

[*]

When the sunlight streams through the partially opened slats of the venetian blinds. Carol teases her husband awake with ticklish kisses along his jawline as they lie on their mattress on the floor. The classroom trailer is spartan, with just the made-up mattress, a teacher's desk, and a bunch of stacked chairs. But for now, it's home.

They make love, slowly and gently this time, as the sun warms their flesh. Spooned back against Daryl afterward, Carol hums contentedly, and he sighs just as contently into the crook of her neck.

He kisses her ear and then drawls, "Mornin', Mrs. Dixon."

 **[*]**

No one tries to call Daryl king, and he's glad for it. Carol appoints him as head of security for the trade team. The man he replaces grumbles of nepotism, and Daryl almost gets into a fist fight with him just to prove he didn't get the position because he's sleeping with the Queen.

Daryl's invited to attend the daily meetings in the Council Chambers in the library of the school, and he does, but he hovers toward the back, leaned against a bookcase, saying little. When he disagrees, he tells Carol privately, at night, in bed.

"If that's what you think," Carol asks, rolling out of his arms to face him, "why don't you _say_ something at the meetings?"

"Don't want people thinkin' 'm tryin' to influence the Queen."

Carol huffs. "Why do you think I want you in those Council Chambers? Speak your mind."

 **[*]**

Married life takes some getting used to.

Carol calls Daryl her "indoor/outdoor cat." She wants him home at dinner time, which is just some damn _made up_ time, as far as he's concerned. He's not supposed to go out hunting without telling her how long he'll be gone. She doesn't want antlers on the trailer wall, but where the hell else are you supposed to put your trophies? And apparently pants belong folded up in the file cabinet drawers and not slung over chairs, and muddy boots aren't supposed to be worn in bed.

She wants him to shower more than once a week, even if he's already scrubbed his face and hands and he didn't even get bloody. He soon learns more showers means more sex, though, and he gets with the program.

She wants an affectionate nickname, too, the way she calls him _Pookie_ , and Shannon called Garland _baby_ , and Garland called Shannon _darling_ and _my love_ and _beautiful_. "Well Garland took 'em all, already," Daryl grumbles.

He tries out a few – babe, honey, sweetheart – but he sounds like he's talking to a child. So he tries a few more – sexy, gorgeous, good-lookin' – but they all make Carol laugh like she doesn't believe he means them.

Finally he says, "Ain't got no name for you. Yer just m'Carol."

"I like being your Carol," she concludes.


	49. Chapter 49

Daryl adjusts to married life, more or less, within Carol's wide tent of tolerance, but building the cabin proves the greater challenge. That last week of May, after their wedding, he draws up plans with the Kingdom's architect and carpenter. The first week of June, he recruits Jerry and some others to help him dig the base. But then a migrating herd of walkers comes too close to the gates, and he has to work with Carol and Dianne and Jerry to redirect it. It takes a week. Because the herd temporarily cut offs the hunters from their prey and drives away a lot of frightened game, the next week he has to hunt longer hours to replenish the dwindling reserves.

By then it's time to take the trade team to Alexandria and the Hilltop and back. When he returns the first week of July, he finds Carol has moved back into the school, because the classroom trailer is far too hot. She's chosen a small classroom for them, as their temporary bedroom, and not the chambers she once inhabited with Ezekiel. The mattress is on the floor. An electric window fan whirs in a slightly opened classroom window. Two filing cabinets serve as dressers.

"Gonna finish that cabin," he tells her.

"I know you will."

In the sweltering heat of the Virginia summer, Daryl secures and sizes and cuts the logs and piles them near the building site. He starts with the hearth and chimney, which he constructs of brick, with the help of the Kingdom's mason. But then one of the archers, whose gone out bird hunting by himself, doesn't come back, and Daryl's sent to track him. It takes three days to find the man, his leg bone snapped from what appears to be a tumble down a ravine, and his flesh gnawed off by walkers. Then there's the grave digging, and the funeral, and the hunting, and by then, it's time for the trade team to make its rounds again.

When he returns the third week of August, the mattress has been set in a frame, and Carol's brought in a wardrobe for their clothes. She's pushed four student desks together to make a little kitchen table in a corner of the classroom, and she's brought in a microwave and hotpot.

"Gonna finish that cabin," he tells her.

"I know you will."

Daryl lays down the floor of the cabin, but then he has to cover the lumber with tarps in anticipation of a storm. A week of heavy rains keeps him from further progress. The Kingdom dries out, but then he has to hunt. He gets the first layer of logs done around the base, the beginnings of the walls, but by then, it's time for the trade team to make its rounds.

When he returns the second week of October, she's put curtains on the classroom windows, brought in a love seat, and thrown down an area rug. Dog is curled up and asleep atop it. The little kitchen table has been covered with a tablecloth.

"Gonna finish that cabin," he tells her.

"I know you will."

But he has to hunt first, every day, and sometimes overnight, to help fill the smokehouse before winter, because the woods outside the Kingdom are now hopping with deer, and the coming cold will drive them into hiding. He only gets one more layer of logs done before it's time for the trade team to set out again for its last trip before the winter hiatus.

When he returns the first day of December, Carol's put up an artificial Christmas tree in the corner of the classroom and decorated it with silver tinsel and red bulbs. There's an unplugged space heater in the corner, ready for use when the weather grows too cold.

"Gonna finish that cabin," he tells her.

"I know you will."

He gets another layer of logs done. The walls are growing. But the heavy rains of August were followed by three months of no rain at all. The field of grass in which the base of the cabin rests is over dry – and that's where the fire starts. It starts because some dumbass kid is playing with fireworks. The Kingdom fights the fire back with a bucket brigade and shovels of dirt, and they succeed in putting it out, but by then, the flames have consumed the partial walls of the cabin, and only the chimney and charred, blackened floor remains.

It takes every fiber in Daryl's being not to turn into his father and beat the ever-living shit out of that kid. He leaves to hunt and to cool down, and he doesn't come back for three days, by which time Carol has organized a search party for him, which is about to head out the gates.

They have their first real married fight, when they're away from the prying eyes of the community, in the classroom that's become their apartment. Carol tells him, "You can't just run off like that anymore, Daryl. I was worried."

"Ya damn well knew I was huntin'!" he explodes.

"Not for three days, I didn't!" she yells back.

"Surprised ya didn't paint the goddamn walls while I was gone!"

"What?" Carol asks in confusion.

He takes an angry step forward and growls, "'Cause ya sure as shit don't trust me to finish that cabin!"

"Ah," she says softly. " _That's_ what this is about." He hates that she doesn't yell back at him, that she won't return fire for fire, because now he feels like an asshole, with her standing there ever so calmly, just like she did on the Greene family farm, when he got up in her face. Except this time she doesn't flinch. "Maybe we should have a conversation about that."

"Ain't interested in no _conversations_ ," he grumbles, his voice much lowered, taking a step back. "Got work to do." He strides to the door.

"Daryl," she says gently, and he sighs. He thuds his forehead against the closed door. She walks over to him, puts her palm open on the small of his back, and kisses his shoulder through his wool poncho. "Building this cabin, what's it _really_ about?"

"'S 'bout bein' a man," he admits, his head still pressed to the door. "Providin'. Makin' a home for m'wife. Instead of just movin' into hers, like a freeloadin' sack of shit." He raises his head and steps back from the door. "Like m'father." he turns toward her but doesn't look at her. "Asshole sat on his ass for years, collectin' disability for an injury he ain't never even really had, drinkin' up half the paycheck my mama earned workin' at the diner."

Carol puts a hand on his hip. "Look at me, Daryl."

Reluctantly, he does.

"Who filled half the Kingdom's smokehouse for the winter by himself?"

"That ain't – "

"- Who filled it?"

"I did."

"And who kept the trade team safe from attacks and made sure it came back with supplies we all needed to live? That his wife needed to live?"

"Me," he mutters.

"And who risked his life to help draw that herd away from the gates of the Kingdom?"

"You."

"And you."

Daryl chews on his thumbnail.

"Daryl, I trust you to build this cabin. And you _will_ , if that's what you want to do. If that's what you need to do. But I don't need that cabin anywhere near as much as I need you to be a full partner with me in making sure _our_ Kingdom is safe, and secure, and well fed. You're the hardest working man I've ever known."

Daryl's thumb drops from his mouth. "M' sorry I yelled at you."

"Apology accepted."

"'N m'sorry I stayed out so long without tellin' ya when I'd be back."

"Don't do it again. I really _was_ worried." She presses her forehead to his and kisses him tenderly.

 **[*]**

Daryl starts from scratch on the cabin. The ten-year-old kid who accidentally burned it down shows up every morning, begging to help him, but Daryl shrugs him off. The fifth day, though, Daryl reluctantly puts him to work. The kid works hard, does what he's told, doesn't talk back – doesn't talk at all. And in a week, Daryl forgives him.

But with the New Year comes a foot of snow. It melts eventually, but just when it does, the temperature drops again, and the ground freezes over. The wood is too brittle to work with. And in the main school building, where the bulk of the Kingdom's subjects live, the pipes freeze over, and the water stops flowing. They have to rely on their emergency stores, which, fortunately are plentiful – Carol had the foresight to order gallons and gallons of great blue storage containers to be filled in the fall.

But the frozen pipes must have developed nearly invisible hairline cracks, and when the thaw comes the first week of March, and they turn the water back on, it runs fine for two days. Then one night, several of the pipes explode at once, spewing water everywhere. By the time they get the water turned off, half the school is flooded. The electricity is shorted out, and the mold spreads. Everyone is moved out of the school and into the classroom trailers, to tents in the courtyard, and to the stand-alone gymnasium. The weather is cold, but it's no longer freezing, and most of the winter snow is gone, except for a lingering patch here and there. Bonfires warm the courtyard.

"The water stores will only last five more days," Carol tells Daryl one evening in the classroom trailer they moved back into from the school. She leans back against the teacher's desk, arms crossed protectively over her chest. "Edward says the pipes can't possibly be repaired in their condition, not with the materials we have, and Jimmy says there's no saving the electrical wiring. We can't dig a well, not in this environment, and we can't get the school to fully dry out. Emily says the mold is dangerous to our health. The school's not fit to house anyone." She sighs. "The Kingdom has fallen, and it's my fault."

Daryl leans back next to her, doesn't know if she wants to be touched, and so he doesn't. But he does know it's his turn to reassure her. "Ain't yer fault. Bound to happen someday."

She sighs. "I haven't served them as well as Ezekiel did."

"Like hell ya haven't. This would of happened if he were still king. Might of happened even sooner. Ya gave these people almost two years after he died." It's been eleven months since they returned from Jamestown, ten since they married. In two more months, it would have been time for the spring fair. It _will_ be time for their first-year anniversary. "Almost two years of peace. No hunger. No bloodshed." He'd say not one man lost, but there was that foolish archer who fell down the ravine. "Ya ain't failed anyone, Carol."

"I'm sending three swift riders," she tells him, "to Alexandria, the Hilltop, and Oceanside, to see how many they're willing to take in. We'll offer two horses, four chickens, and one pig to each camp for taking them in, but it won't be nearly enough to compensate for so many people."

"'S like Aaron said, when he took us to Alexandria. _People_ are the resource."

"But they also strain resources," Carol reminds him. "Those three camps can't possibly take in all of us."

In two days, the riders return with letters. The other communities are generous; they agree to open wide their gates, but it isn't enough. There are still thirty people who can't be housed. Carol discusses the matter privately with Daryl, as they sit shoulder to shoulder on the great stone steps of the abandoned school.

"Parents with children under fourteen, women who are pregnant, and the elderly get priority," Carol tells him. "We send them all to the alliance camps."

"That leaves how many?" Daryl asks.

"Forty-five. We'll select twenty-eight of those to go with us."

"Thought ya'd want to go live at Oceanside with Henry."

"A son's a son until he takes him a wife," Carol says. "Henry's getting married soon. He doesn't need me anymore, but these people still do. They need you, too."

"A'ight. 'M onboard." Carol's right. The remnants of the Kingdom, the ones who can't be taken in by the Alliance - they have no one to lead them.

"We pack up today," Carol says, "and set out at daybreak in a pilgrim train. We split at the fork in the road. Jerry will lead one group to the Hilltop. Dianne will lead another to Oceanside. William will lead a third to Alexandria. And you and I, we'll lead the fourth group."

"Where to?" Daryl asks. "Monticello? Got stables. Pond for fishin'. Pens for livestock. Slave quarters for housin' people. Would need to build a good gate 'n fence."

"It seemed like a frequent herd crossing location, though."

"Mhmhm…." He murmurs in agreement. "How 'bout that ski lodge? Had a creek. Lots of rooms."

"And a bunch of walkers you had to kill in the morning. And no fencing. Four points of entry at least."

"That bed 'n breakfast, with the creek? 'N it had that cool storage cellar already."

"Much too small for thirty people. And too open to defend long-term. But there's another option."

"'S that?" Daryl asks.

"You freed a lion once, by chewing through his net. And a kindness is never wasted."

"Ya wanna lead 'em to Jamestown, 'n throw ourselves on their mercy?"

"Garland said the gates of Jamestown were always open to us."

"Us," Daryl murmurs. "Not us 'n twenty-eight other people."

"We bring talents."

Daryl toys with a twig he scooped up from the courtyard.

"Jamestown has 600 people," Carol says. "An entire massive river. Fishing and farming and lots and lots of land. It takes in people, always has. And it could absorb thirty more."

"If it's still standin'." He taps the twig against his chin. "If Garland or someone decent is still in charge. _If_ they take us in."

Carol takes the twig from his hand and begins to toy with it herself. "Do you have a better idea?"

"Nah. No. I don't," he admits. "Gonna send riders 'n ask?"

"It's too far for riders. We'd be out of stores before they got back and have no food or water for the journey." She bends the twig. "I say we take our stores and we go. And if they say no…well, we figure it out from there." The twig snaps in Carol's hands, like the pipes snapped, like the Kingdom did.


	50. Chapter 50

There are hugs and tears at the fork in the road, where the Kingdom fractures. "Thank you for the time you've given us," Jerry tells Carol. "You'll always be Queen Carol to me."

"You're doing right by these people," Dianne assures her. "And you'll be back, for the annual fair."

"There is no annual fair anymore," Carol says sadly.

"There will be," William assures her. "The tradition will continue. Whether at Hilltop, or Oceanside, or Alexandria."

"Oceanside this year," Dianne insists. "I'll convince them. There's no time to prepare for a spring fair, but we'll make it a fall fair this time. November 15th. A final chance to trade before the winter. Come to Oceanside then, my queen. See your son. See your friends. And tell us how you've prospered."

Carol smiles. She holds out her hand, because Dianne is not a hugger, and the woman shakes it soundly.

Daryl rolls his motorcycle up onto the horse-drawn cart of supplies Jerry's taking with him to the Hilltop and secures it next to a cage of chickens. He's only ridden the bike three times in the past ten months, including today, when he rode it as far as the fork in the road. Now it's nearly out of fuel. There's no room for it on the one wagon they're taking with them to Jamestown.

"Give m'bike to Aaron," he tells Jerry. "As a thank you for takin' y'all in." Aaron was the one who gave him the base of the bike to start with, a lifetime ago, in Alexandria. It's not just a thank you for taking the Kingdom's refuges into the Hilltop. It's a thank you for giving Daryl a purpose at a time when he felt very much on the outside. Daryl rubs the seat of the bike, like he's saying goodbye to an old friend.

Dog barks, and at Daryl's command of "Up, boy!" jumps into the wagon bound for Jamestown. It will be pulled by Carol's stallion, Lancelot, and by one of the Kingdom's mares, Guinevere. There are supplies for the journey onboard – tents, some food, and several gallons of water. Eight people also sit on the benches along the sides. The rest of the group will walk on foot, taking turns on the wagon. Half volunteered for the long trek to Jamestown. Half were chosen by lot and resigned themselves to their uncertain fate.

Daryl falls in step beside Carol, at the front of the pilgrim train. He walks shoulder to shoulder with his friend, his lover, his wife, his partner in this new chapter of life, and in every chapter of their ever-changing story. On the dirt road before them, an early spring wildflower, far ahead of its peers, stubbornly claws its way up from the muddy clay. The flower bends under the weight of its own bright yellow petals and droops toward the ground, but it doesn't fall. Daryl crouches, plucks it up, and stands to hold it out to Carol. She smiles tenderly, takes the flower, and tucks it behind her ear.

[*]

The journey takes twice as long with so many people as it took for Daryl and Carol to return from Jamestown. They scavenge along the way to bolster their supplies, but, finding nothing, they soon run out of food.

"We should have stayed in the Kingdom," a woman grumbles. "Even rundown, it would have been better than all this wandering."

"We're not wandering," Edward, the former Kingdom's plumber tells her. "We're headed somewhere."

"Somewhere none of us has ever seen," another man says. "Somewhere that might not even exist anymore!"

Carol ignores the grumbling. She sends Daryl and one of the Kingdom's archers to hunt, and two more knights to run creek water through filters into the now empty storage jugs. That evening, they have to pack up their temporary camp in the middle of the night and flee from walkers.

"I never should have volunteered," a man complains. "I should have taken my chance with the lottery. Maybe I'd be at the Hilltop now."

"Or on the sunny shores of Oceanside," a woman grumbles.

As they near Jamestown, Daryl stills in the spot where the first flag relay tower stands, three or so miles outside of the gates of Jamestown. It's vacant and overgrown. Ivy creeps up the supports and weaves its way in and out of the wooden slats, and the trees that mask it drop their branches all the way to the platform. It hasn't been used in months. A growl of concern reverberates in his throat.

The next watch stand, a mile up the road, is empty, also. Empty, but not overgrown.

Carol's heart grows heavy as they march onward, and the murmurs of grumbling behind her grow louder. The third watchstand, however, less than a mile from Jamestown, is manned, which Carol sees through her binoculars a half mile away. She lets out a sigh of relief.

"Someone there?" Daryl asks.

"Yes."

"He spot us?"

"We're hard _not_ to spot. He put up his rifle and is signaling back to Jamestown with the flag." Carol lowers the binoculars around her neck, raises a hand, and orders her people, "All weapons holstered, sheathed, and shouldered." There's a chorus of clicking and snapping. "Raise the flag, Jody."

A woman slides a flag pole from the back of the wagon and unfurls it to reveal a blue peace symbol on a white background. She raises it above her head and begins to wave it just enough to keep it unfurled and visible as the pilgrim train marches on.

[*]

When they're within a fourth of a mile, Daryl insists on the binoculars. He slows to a crawl of a walk as he looks at the watch stand. "That who I think it is?"

He hands the binoculars back to her, and she takes a look. "Who do you think it is?"

"Daniel."

"Who's Daniel?"

"M' cellmate the first two nights in Jamestown. The one they banished 'cause he helped them fugitives escape."

"The one who tried to steal Freckles?" Carol asks. "The one you gave an MRE to, instead of just shooting him?"

"Mhm."

"Why would they take him back?"

Daryl grips the strap of the crossbow that rides his back. Maybe they didn't. Maybe Daniel found a group and told them about Jamestown. Maybe that group took it over. The idea leaves a hollow feeling in the pit of his gut. What if he left a man alive, and because he did, Jamestown has fallen, and Garland and Shannon are dead?

"Stay back," Carol orders her people. "Wait here. Daryl and I will approach."

Cautiously, weapons holstered, sheathed, and shouldered but still within immediate reach, Carol and Daryl near the stand. Daniel scurries down from the watchtower, swings his rifle onto his shoulder, and marches forward to meet them.

"Hoooooolllllly shit!" Daniel says when they're within shouting distance. "Hooollllly shit!"

Carol and Daryl stop walking and let Daniel close the distance between them.

"I _thought_ it was you," says Daniel, grinning at Daryl. "My old roomie! Almost didn't recognize you with the real short hair and no goatee."

Two days before the pipes burst, Daryl lost a bet with Jerry. He got in an argument with the man over a lyric in some Led Zeppelin song and swore he'd shave his goatee off if Jerry was right, because Jerry was too young to know more shit about Zeppelin than he did. But when they got the record out, it turned out Jerry was one hell of a music buff, and Daryl's memory was a little faulty on that _one_ particular lyric. When the goatee came off, the hair didn't look right at all. So he had the Kingdom's barber cut that back, too, and now it's as short as it was when he was in the Atlanta quarry camp. He's been trying to grow the goatee back, but for some reason the hair on his face is stubborn about growing, and all he has at the moment is a fine fuzz.

"Did you dye your hair, too?" Daniel asks.

"No, I didn't fuckin' dye my hair!" What kind of vainglorious asshole does Daniel think he is? "Just looks a lot lighter when 's short." And when it's lighter, the gray isn't as obvious.

Daniel nods over his shoulder. "What's with the wagon train?"

"Jamestown take you back?" Daryl asks.

"Yes, they did. And as you can see, I have a prestigious position," he says sarcastically. "Standing around all day looking at nothing. But it's better than cleaning fish."

"Why they take ya back?"

"'Cause I finally found myself a camp, one full of ruthless men." Daryl's hand tightens on his bowstrap. "They knew about Jamestown, had been spying it out." Carol's hand falls to the hilt of her knife. "Didn't know I was from there. I found out they were planning an attack, and they had thirty men and lots of automatic firepower. So I snuck out one night and came to Jamestown. Told them the plan – the hour and the minute and the direction they'd be coming from." Carol and Daryl's hands relax. "And then I fought alongside them when they came. We took every single one of those motherfuckers out when they showed up."

"Good thing you didn't shoot him after all," Carol says.

The guilty tension in Daryl's gut unravels. His nerves tighten, however, when Daniel says, "Only lost three Jamestown men in the fight."

"Garland still sheriff?" Daryl asks.

"No. No. He's not sheriff any more." He nods over Daryl's shoulder to the people. "I take it you're looking for refuge?"

"Yeah," Daryl answers. "Is Garland still alive?" he asks anxiously. "Or did he die in that battle?"

"Garland's still kicking around," Daniel answers. "I'll signal ahead that you're coming and that you're peaceful. What they decide to do with you is another matter." Daniel waves his arm in a circle like he's rolling out a welcome mat. "Thou shalt pass." Then he shakes his head, laughs, and runs to the watchtower. Rifle shouldered, he climbs up it and grabs the flag and starts sending Morse code to the watchman at the gates of Jamestown.

[*]

They're divested of their weapons and all their goods by armed guards at the gate. "Are they taking _everything_?" Emily, the Kingdom's former doctor, asks.

"It will be worth the price," Carol promises her. "If they admit us."

"And if they don't?" another man wants to know.

"Then we'll at least get our weapons and horses back," she says, "unless the law has changed."

"You didn't tell us we'd be robbed if we came here!" another man grumbles.

"Don't worry," Edward tells Carol. "They grumbled against Moses in the wilderness, too, but eventually he did lead them to the Promised Land."

"I appreciate the confidence," Carol tells him, and she does, because she's not so confident herself. She doesn't recognize any of the guards who are stripping them of their things, and if Garland isn't sheriff anymore, she's not sure they have an in.

"Where ya takin' my dog?" Daryl asks one of the guards.

"To the stables. It'll be fed."

"Your group will wait for now in the museum theater," another one of the guards tells Carol. He points from Carol to Daryl. "Are you two the leaders?"

"Yes," Carol replies.

"Then come with me. The Mayor will see you first."

They're lead to the captain's old office and told to sit down in the two chairs across from the desk. "Mayor Barron will be with you shortly." The guard retreats to just outside the doorway, where he stands straight with his back against the wall.

"Do you recognize that name?" Carol asks him.

"Nah. Didn't meet any Barrons while we was here."

At first, Daryl doesn't recognize the man who enters the room five minutes later and shuts the door behind himself. His wispy, Doc Holiday style goatee has been replaced by a full on, dark brown beard, and his thick, wavy, shoulder length hair has been cut to halfway up his neck. He's not wearing his familiar white Stetson. The blue-gray eyes are the same, though, and Carol says, "Garland?"


	51. Chapter 51

"Carol? _Daryl_?" Garland drops the folder he's carrying on the desk as Carol scurries to her feet to hug him. Daryl rises and holds out his hand. As Garland shakes, he says, "Daniel just signaled there was a group coming in for refuge. I didn't know it was _yours_."

"Didn't recognize ya at first," Daryl tells him.

"Or I you," Garland tells him. "You look ten years younger!"

"Growin' it back," Daryl insists, running his hand over the soft stubble on his cheeks where his goatee once was.

Garland pops his head out the door to dismiss the guard. "Go tell Shannon that Carol and Daryl are here. I know she's somewhere in the museum."

" _That's_ Daryl Dixon?" the guard asks in a voice of awe and peers in the room. He's about twenty-five and blonde, and his blue eyes are starstruck. "Oh, sir, can I shake your hand?" He steps in with his hand out toward Daryl.

Carol stifles a snort while Daryl skeptically shakes the guard's hand.

"And yours, ma'am?" the guard asks. "Carol Stuart?"

"Carol Dixon." Carol extends her hand to shake the guard's, but he raises it to his lips and kisses it, smiling as he lowers it. "It's a true honor."

Garland waves him out impatiently, and the guard scurries on.

"Hell was that?" Daryl asks as Garland closes the door.

"Let's just say you two are legendary around here, given how you brought down the mutineers." Garland plops down into the desk chair and gestures for them to sit down across from him. "Kayden is relatively new. He and his sister stumbled on Jamestown in July, but he's heard the stories. And seen the exhibit."

"The _exhibit_?" Carol asks as she sits down in the chair across from him.

"Shannon had the…perfectly Shannonesque idea to redo a section of the museum to contain exhibits about the history of Jamestown as the first permanent post-apocalyptic settlement. She figures it will serve as a history lesson to future generations. There's an exhibit on the Heroes of the Mutiny of 7 NE."

Daryl sits in the chair next to Carol's "NE?"

"New Era. It's how the council has chosen to date things. BNE – Before the New Era and NE – New Era. The NE dating starts with the first January to follow the Great Sickness."

"Guard said yer name was _Mayor Barron?_ " Daryl asks.

"Barron's my surname," Garland answers. "We held elections in July, after the transition, and I was elected Mayor of Jamestown."

"But ya ain't sheriff?" Daryl asks.

"When the men and women of the town council drew up a new charter in August, they decided a person can't be _both_ sheriff _and_ mayor. They wanted to make sure the mayor stays accountable to the law. So I stepped down from that position and Earl – you remember my old bailiff?" Daryl nods. "He's sheriff now."

"You said the men _and_ women on the council?" Carol asks. "You have some women in the government now?"

"Three. There's Ana – you met her. She was the judge who presided at the treason trial. I think Daryl met our veterinarian, Carolyn?"

Daryl nods.

"She's on the council. And uh…well…." He smiles. "Let's just say my lovely wife knows how to _politic_. Shannon greased palms and kissed babies, promised a chicken in every pot, and got herself elected to the council after the transition."

"I'm not surprised," Carol replies with a smile. "Who else is on your council?"

"Dr. Ahmad is a member," Garland answers. "Then Barry, he's a hunter, I think Daryl worked with him while he was here. There's a former sailor, who's now a captain – which is to say he mans one of the ships. But a captain has no special power above that of anyone else on the council. There's a fisherman, and our new farm manager. And then there's me. As mayor, I'm the ninth member and chairman of the council." Garland leans back in his chair and asks, "So I understand you've come with a group of twenty-eight men and women, seeking refuge?"

"Mhmhm," Daryl murmurs.

"What happened to the Kingdom?"

Carol solemnly tells him about the community's collapse and how she got most of her people to safety in other camps in the alliance. "That school was never an ideal location for a camp," Carol says. "Ezekiel made it work, though, and so I built on what he started, for as long as I could."

"And I'm sure your people are grateful to you for that." Garland tents his fingers. "So here's how this works now. We're going to interview all your people – find out their skills and talents. Earl and his deputies are doing that even as we speak. We're going to search and inventory all their belongings. After the interviews, the council will meet, discuss the matter, and then vote on whether or not to grant you probationary admission."

"No trial?" Carol asks.

"We don't have trials for that purpose anymore. Ana convinced us it was too inefficient. Now if the council say yes, we're going to ask for an entry payment of some sort, some portion of what you brought with you, and the rest we'll return. If the price is agreeable to you, we'll take you in on a probationary basis."

"Would we be expected to go four months without weapons?" Carol asks.

"No. The probation period is only one month now, but you'll get your weapons back right away, after the vote, and you'll have them while on probation. As long as you don't break any laws during that month, and you haul your weight, you'll become full citizens of Jamestown in just four weeks, which means you'll have the right to vote for council, to sue in court, and all the other protections and benefits of citizenship. But you get the responsibilities right away. Once you're accepted for probationary admission, you'll be assigned jobs – twenty hours of work a week to contribute to the community. In exchange, you get basic, sustenance rations. That leaves you time to work for each other's rations if someone can't work."

"Everyone can work," Daryl says.

"Then you can spend that extra time growing food in your own private gardens, or hunting and fishing and scavenging."

"If we do," Daryl asks, "how much goes to the common pot?"

"None, if you're doing it on your own time. What you catch or find or grow on the clock goes entirely in the common pot. Everything you do on your _own time_ is _yours_. As for housing - "

"- We just need someplace to pitch our tents," Carol says.

"Well, you can't be in tents out here in the winter or during thunderstorm season. We have some extra beds available. We've lost a few people, but we've also been preparing for the possibility of growth, whether through birth or through taking in refuges."

"Wanna build a cabin," Daryl says, "for me 'n m'wife. A piece of land somewhere inside the gates is all I ask."

"You'll be given land to build on, if that's what you want," Garland says, as though he already assumes the council will vote to take them in. "Our _tools_ are freely available to you at no cost, but nails, screws, things in short supply – you need to pay for those. You can do that with extra labor for the community or through bartering goods. You can also scavenge your own supplies, and you're free to cut down trees in the designated lumber areas. While you're building, you can - "

The door bursts open, and there's a squee of excitement, followed by, "Carol! Oh my God I can't believe y'all are here!"

Shannon looks no different. Her long, curly red hair is the same length, and her eyes are just as green, but she's put on some weight. A _lot_ of weight. It's not until Carol has stood up to hug her that she realizes the woman is pregnant. Carol steps back after the hug and asks – "You and Garland are having a baby?"

"I'm about to drop in eight to ten weeks," Shannon answers. "We weren't planning on having one, but Garland's not always successful at pulling out."

Garland rubs his eyes. "Darling, please. They don't need the details."

By now Daryl has stood up and also gives her a sideways hug before he peers down at her pregnant belly. "Congrats, man," he tells Garland.

"Did you tell them they're welcome to live with us?" Shannon asks.

"I hadn't gotten around to it. But, yes, you two are welcome to live with us until you get your cabin built." He adds, hastily, almost as an afterthought, "Assuming the council approves your admission."

Daryl licks his lips and says, "Can't wait to get me a piece of Grandma Bonnie's strawberry pie!"

"Oh," Shannon says, almost as if she's sadder for him than she is for herself, "I'm sorry, sugar, but my mother passed away this past fall."

Daryl's thumbnail goes straight to his mouth and he mutters a condolence.

"We had a really bad bout of influenza in September," Shannon explains. "Garland ordered a quarantine, which probably limited the deaths, and Dr. Ahmad and the others fought it valiantly, but we still lost a few people, especially among the young and the old."

"Is Gary all right?" Carol asks with alarm.

"Gary's fine," Garland answers. "Unfortunately, we lost two of the orphans, including our little Terrance." Garland grits his teeth. He pushes back his chair and stands. "Well, let's go talk to your people."

When they get to the theater, a group of three guards is peering inside and whispering to each other. "Twelve," one says.

"No, eight," replies the second.

"I saw twelve," the first insists.

"But four look like they're already taken," says the third. "And that girl can't even be seventeen yet. So only seven."

"Boys," Shannon calls, and they suddenly snap to attention. "You can worry about picking flowers and wooing the new ladies later. Right now I need one of you to gather the town council and send them to the council chambers."

"Yes, Councilwoman," a guard replies.

"You other two can go back to the front gate," Garland tells them.

The guards disburse and Carol and Daryl go into the theater where Earl and his deputies are interviewing the Kingdom's people and taking notes. Earl looks up from his spiral notebook, tucks his pencil in his front pocket, and comes over to greet them both. The salt-and-pepper haired deputy has grown a handlebar mustache.

"We got them all some apple juice and cornbread," Earl says. "They said they hadn't eaten since last night, and it's already mid-afternoon."

"Thank you," Carol tells him.

A woman from the Kingdom raises her cup of apple juice and says, "Sorry we doubted you, Queen Carol!"

Earl grins. " _Queen_?"

Carol shrugs.

"You should explain to your people what's going on," Garland tells her. "Shannon and I need to go to the council chambers. I'll be back once a decision is made."

Carol goes to the stage before the screen to explain what's happening. Earl and his deputies resume their interviews and note taking. That takes about an hour, at which point Earl tells Daryl and Carol, "I need to go report to the council. Sit tight here." He leaves two of his deputies at the door.

Only fifty minutes passes, but it seems like an eternity waiting. Garland returns and draws Daryl and Carol aside. "The council has voted to offer your group probationary admission. The admission fee will be your wagon, for communal use, and the first foal to be bred by your stallion and mare."

"And?" asks Carol. She was expecting them to demand more for the safety of fences, the plenty of the docks and fields, and the beds they're offering.

"That's it. All of your other things will be immediately returned to you."

Carol takes the stage before the movie screen and tells the remnants of the Kingdom the terms of admission. "All in favor of accepting Jamestown's offer?"

Every hand goes up.


	52. Chapter 52

With their packs on their shoulders and their restored weapons at their sides, the people of the fallen Kingdom follow Garland from the theater. Heads turn in every direction with a mixture of curiosity, awe, and trepidation. Mayor Barron leads them through the foyer of the museum and down the hallway marked _offices_.

As he walks, he strolls with a manila folder full of loose notebook papers in his hand. He points the folder through an open doorway. "This is the breakroom. You're welcome to use it any time if you need a microwave or hot pot, but don't touch the food in the cabinets or fridge. That's all for the orphans." He leads them on.

"Your whole camp has power?" Jimmy, the Kingdom's former electrician asks.

"Only in this museum," Garland answers. "But half our solar backup batteries no longer work, so we do ration and we do still have browns out."

"I can take a look at those backup batteries," Jimmy suggests. "I know a few tricks for getting a little extra life out of them."

"Then I think I know what your job is going to be." Garland leads the group on and pauses in the hallway and points at the infirmary. "This is our clinic. There's always someone on duty. That's our field medic in there right now. Thomas. He's the one who patched Carol up when she was stabbed in the woods." Thomas waves to them through the open blinds of the window. Garland flicks open his folder, runs his finger down a page, and asks, "Emily Norton?"

Carol calls the Kingdom's doctor forward.

"You'll be working here, on a rotating schedule with Dr. Ahamad and our other medical personnel." Garland looks back at the notes Earl gave him. "You're married?"

"She is!" calls Emily's husband, stepping forward, apparently anxious that if he doesn't claim her, some other Jamestown man might.

"Then you two can have this office as a bedroom, since Emily will be on call some nights." Garland points to an office cattycorner to the infirmary. "It used to belong to our nurse. She died fighting that flu. It already has a double-size bed in it. Why don't you two drop your things, and we'll get you some fresh sheets from storage later?"

The married couple goes inside, drops their packs and rejoins the tour group.

Garland throws open a door to reveal a long, wide, former office. "This used to be the captain's bedroom chambers," he explains to Carol and Daryl, "but we turned it into communal housing, in case we should need it. It's currently unoccupied."

There are two sets of bunk beds in the room, with three beds each, a dresser, a wardrobe, a changing stall, and a hutch-style pantry as well as a small table with two chairs. He opens the file folder again and runs his finger down it and calls out six names. The first is the widow of the archer who died in that ravine, and the second is her fifteen-year-old daughter. The next four are all single women. Earl must have asked everyone about their relationship status. "You can stay here," Garland tells them. "Feel free to drop your things."

Each woman claims a bunk.

Next, Garland rounds a corner and shows them the old employee locker rooms. He taps a clipboard. "You can sign up on the schedule for one hot shower a week. Keep it under ten minutes. Otherwise you bathe in the washing troughs or river. This building is fed by gravity wells, but they can run dry quickly if overused. We have other old-school wells throughout the community. There are three toilets in each of these locker rooms that are on a septic system. Don't use any other toilets in the museum. We've had sewage issues with those. There are also outhouses throughout the community." He flicks open the file folder again. "Edward Wilson? Plumber?"

Edward emerges from the group with a raised hand. "That's me."

"You'll help us keep these bathrooms up and running. Report here to meet our water engineer at ten tomorrow."

Edward nods.

Next Garland shows them the library, at which point they've reached a dead end and have to backtrack. They head through the open part of the museum that houses the orphanage. The kids are not currently there. Garland opens his folder again. "Anika Dogra and Kelly Hopkins?"

Two women in their early twenties step forward. Both were childcare providers in the Kingdom. "You can stay here," Garland tells them, tapping an empty bunk with two beds. "People have been volunteering to rotate night duty here. It will be good to have someone permanent on call. You'd just need to be available for the children at night in case they wake up and need to be taken to the bathroom, or if they have a bad dream. Then walk them to school in the morning. You'll have your days off and you can switch out nights with each other, in case one of you should have somewhere else to be one night."

"I'll give them somewhere else to be!" a patrol man walking through the museum calls. He's in his late twenties, with black hair, brown eyes and dimples that pock both cheeks when he smiles.

"Aren't you supposed to be on the docks to relieve the patrol, Derek?" Garland asks him.

"Headed there right now, Mayor."

"I apologize for that," Garland tells the young women. "We have a bit of a gender imbalance here. So if there's ever a man giving you trouble or making you uncomfortable, you just report it to the Sheriff Earl Carter."

"How about I report it to my knife?" Anika replies with a hand on the hilt.

Garland glances at her warily. "Vigalintism is frowned upon in Jamestown. And that seems an excessive response to some unwatned attention."

"She was joking," Kelly tells him. "And besides, Derek _is_ kind of cute." She tosses a pack on a bed.

Anita laughs and claims her bunk.

Garland continues the tour. He doesn't lead the group directly out the big museum exit to the docks, but instead navigates through parts of the museum Carol and Daryl didn't explore the first time here. Carol takes up the rear for now, and she can hear two of the single Kingdom women, Elizabeth and Ava, whispering about Garland. "Nice ass," Elizabeth observes.

"Unique eyes, too," Ava says. "What color is that even? Gray or blue?"

"Did you see a wedding ring?" Elizabeth asks.

Garland shows them all the laundry room, where there are two industrial washers and dryers and three ironing boards with electric irons. He assigns two women to report to work there in the morning, women, Carol notices, who did a lot of cooking, cleaning, and laundry in the Kingdom. Earl's notes must be thourough.

"We use these machines to wash and dry the clothes of the orphans and all the bedding and towels in Jamestown," Garland explains. "You can turn in your bedding once a month and your towels twice a month to have them laundered for you. We'll get y'all on the schedule. But you'll wash your own clothes in the river with washboards and dry them on lines. We just don't have the electricty and water to let everyone use these machinces. But you can use the irons in here anytime you like."

Edward laughs. "Who would be so vain?" Then he observes Garland's own pressed shirt beneath his crisp black vest and his smile fades.

"I had a court appearance this morning," Garland explains.

"Well, every girl's crazy about a sharp dressed man," Elizabeth tells Garland with a flirtatious smile.

"My wife thinks so, too." Garland moves on and opens a locked door in the hallway and steps inside. "This is cold storage." There are three refrigerators and five deep freezers inside, as well as numerous plastic igloo coolers and shelves full of food. One of the freezers is unplugged with the door lifted up. The mayor flicks open his folder. "Ken Baker?"

"That's me," says Ken, stepping forward.

"You used to work for Sears Appliance?"

Ken nods.

"Report here at 1 PM tomorrow to talk with our other appliance guy and on that freezer."

"Yes, sir."

Next, Garland leads them through an open door into a large room. "This is our arsenal. We don't actually have many weapons in here, because everyone holds onto their own. But we have ammunition, arrows, spare parts, tools, gun powder, bullets, and related supplies." The old exhibit photographs on the wall have been covered up by floor-to-ceiling metal shelving bursting with the items Garland just described. Y'all get fifteen rounds of ammo a week, which you can use for practice, trade for other goods, or store up for a rainy day. Hunters, guards, depuites, and the like get additional rounds."

"Maybe you can trade your ammo for nails and other supplies to build the cabin," Carol whispers to Daryl, since she knows he'll be using his crossbow to hunt. She's not giving up hers, though. She hasn't been able to get in any range practice for a couple of years now, given the Kingdom's dearth of ammunition. She likes the idea of practicing with seven shots a week and hoarding the other eight rounds.

A long wooden bench with two Dillon Precision reloading presses lines one of the walls, and two men sit pouring in gun powder and cranking down handles. Plastic buckets full of spent brass for reloading line the floor beneath the bench.

Daryl points to a black metal object on the far end of the bench. "'S that what I think it is?"

"What do you think it is?" Garland asks.

"A high-end crossbow press."

"Well, then it probably is. You're welcome to come in here and use it anytime you like."

"Who uses it?" Daryl wants to know.

"We had a crossbow hunter. We lost him in that battle Daniel warned us was coming. You're welcome to his bolts and spare strings and bow. You'll be hunting for your twenty hours, and we don't have any other crossbow men." Garland strolls over to one of the shelves, plucks up the crossbow, and brings it to Daryl.

Daryl grins like a kid at Christmas when he takes it and looks it over.

"Drake!" Garland calls to one of the men reloading ammunition. There's a whir and the clatter of brass before the man walks over. "Check the inventory for Bill's old bolts and strings and bring them over to my cabin later."

"Did the council approve requisitioning all those?" Drake eyes the crossbow in Daryl's hand.

"No one else has asked for them," Garland says. "And Bill had no will. They've just been sitting in the arsenal unused since November."

"Did the council _approve_?" Drake repeats.

"You're quite right," Garland tells him. "I'll run it by the council at the meeting tomorrow and have a formal requisition order sent." He gestures to Daryl for the crossbow, which Daryl hands over reluctantly, looking like a kid the day _after_ Christmas.

After Garland puts it back, he opens the file folder. "Carter Thomas?"

A man raises his hand and steps forward. "That's me."

"You're a gunsmith?"

"Yes, sir. Mayor."

"Then you'll be working in this arsenal, doing repairs. Report at 10 am tomorrow."

"Yes, sir."

"You got the power to assign all the jobs," Daryl asks, "but not to sign out a crossbow?"

"Well, the council voted to allow me to assign you jobs just to streamline things. They can always decide to reassign you later."

Soon they enter another, cut-out room of the museum, which is empty except for the exhibits, two filing cabinets, a bookcase, and a long table in the center, surrounded by nine chairs. "This is our council chambers, and also our community's museum," Garland tells them. "If y'all want to look around for a moment, this will tell you the history of our camp, from the onset of the Great Sickness until the last exhibit was added a month ago."

The Kingdom's former inhabitants fan out in the large room. The old display cases have been opened and used to house new objects, and the old display boards have been papered over with pages containing handwritten stories and explanations.

Carol follows Daryl to one of the displays and looks down at the captain's black and white Navy dress hat in a plastic display case. The display board reads: _Captain Henry John Smitty (a.k.a. John Smith) 38 BNE – 7 NE_

"Knew his name couldn't really be John Smith!" Daryl mutters.

Carol smiles. She reads over the narrative. "He really did save a lot of lives," she says.

They move on to a copy of the original town charter in a glass case, with a note on the display board saying it's since been revised and the new charter is available for review at any time in the council archives.

Then they find a wooden memorial plaque hand carved with the list of names of the fifteen Jamestown citizens who died in the raid that Shannon's old camp perpetrated in 5 NE. On the display board beside the plaque is the tale of the assimilation of the raiders' orphans and widows, concluding, "Jamestown is a place of new beginnings, where the past can be left behind."

There's another plaque commemorating the three men who died in the fight against the group Daniel warned Jamestown about, as well as a little biography of Daniel himself, along with a sketch of his profile. "From banishment to hero of the One-day War," the line beneath his face reads. "Jamestown is the home of second chances."

"Sensin' a theme," Daryl mutters.

There are more displays about the early Navy men who founded the place and died in 1 and 2 NE, "fighting back the cannibal hordes." There's a display about the first sheriff of "the New Jamestown," and how he was murdered in 3 NE and Garland Barron solved the case and became the second sheriff of the New Jamestown, "only to later become its first mayor."

There's the "hall of infamy," listing all those who have been hanged for treason, murder, rape, and mutiny, along with the dates of their execution. "No new names," Carol observes.

An exhibit on "the Great Sickness" discusses various popular theories as to its origin and contains sketches of "the cannibals," as well as a list of "alternative names" that have been used to describe them by those who have stumbled upon Jamestown: flesh-eaters, rotters, rabids, chompers, the soulless, wendigos, lurchers, the undead, and walkers.

Finally, they stumble upon their _own_ display. Daryl smacks a finger down on the plastic case. "That's _my_ arrow," he growls. " _Thought_ I was short one when they gave back m'bow!"

Carol chuckles. "You can donate it to posterity, Pookie, can't you?"

His throat rumbles.

There's also a knife in one of the cases – the one Daryl took off of one of the sailors and used to kill the other mutineers. "That's a bit morbid," Carol says. "I guess Shannon has a dark streak I didn't know about." She looks up at the wall above the cases, where she finds two, full-body charcoal sketches that have been drawn of her and Daryl. In Daryl's sketch, he's holding a knife in each hand, his head bent, like he's ready to come in for a kill. In hers, she's unsheathing her knife. "Those are pretty good likenesses to be drawn from memory," Carol observes.

"Ain't got a scar down my cheek!"

"No, but it _is_ kind of sexy, isn't it?" Carol wiggles an eyebrow at him.

"Yeah, well, artist gave ya bigger tits."

"My tits are big enough, thank you."

"Never said they weren't. Yer tits are goddamn perfect. He just gave ya bigger ones."

"How do you know the artist is a he?" Carol asks.

"'Cause he gave ya bigger tits," Daryl insists.

Carol turns and calls over her shoulder. "Garland? Who draws the sketches?"

The mayor strolls over from a couple he was talking to and comes to a stop beside them. "Andrew. One of the deputies. He used to be a sketch artist for the York County police, before the Great Sickness. You both met him. He helped Earl haul Harold's body out of our cabin."

"Yeah, well, I need a word with Andrew," Daryl grumbles. "Obviously been thinkin' way too much 'bout m'wife's tits."

Carol chuckles. They move on through the displays and find a sketch of the old manager. The man's straw hat rests in a plastic display case. Then there's a memorial to Hank, "the patrolman who gave his life in the Mutiny of 7 NE." No mention of _why_ he managed to get his throat slit.

"This shit's ridiculous," Daryl mutters underneath his breath.

"Oh, I don't know," Carol replies. "I think Ezekiel was onto something when he built the Kingdom around tradition and ceremony and legend. That sort of thing has a way of cementing people together. This museum is a dream, a dream for a future where all this suffering really _is_ just history." She bumps his shoulder with her own. "You're just going to have to get used to the admiration, Pookie."

Daryl glances up at his sketch on the wall. "I do look pretty damn bad ass," he admits.


	53. Chapter 53

As the tour group moves on, the Kingdom's former subjects are awed by the busy docks. The manila file folder rustles. "Jakob Wexler?" Garland says. "You'll be working on boat repairs. And Mark Spruce? You'll be with the fishermen."

One of the Kingdom's knights, Sarah, speaks up: "You have a very solid iron fence at your entry, and I saw you had one on the other side of the museum and one extending up along the fields there. I assume your whole camp is fenced in on three sides up to the dock?"

"Yes. And there's wood fencing around the settlement, but that's original, part of the recreation of Fort Jamestown."

"But what about the dock itself?" Sarah asks. "It's _right_ on the river. Walkers can't swim, but people can. And they can bring boats up and down here. It seems like you have a completely open entry point."

"What's your name?" After she tells him, Garland consults his file, and says, "A _knight_? I'll assign you to the dock patrol. But to answer your question, if you look at the edge of the dock there," Garland points to one end, "you can see some metal rising above the water about three feet."

"Oh, yes, I see it now," Sarah says. "What is that?"

"It's a chain link barrier we have extending across the river on both ends of the dock to the fence on the other shore. It cordon off this dock. We send a rower out to roll it back when we're letting our own ships in and out, but anyone trying to sail in will get caught up on it. Now, they could jump ship _over_ it and swim in at us, or get down from their boats and try to undo the barrier, but that's highly noticeable. Our patrol should see them. Or that man in the lighthouse will." He points across the river to a lighthouse on a rocky peninsula that extends into the river in front of the fence line on the oppose shore. "We always keep a long-distance rifleman in there now."

"That would have been a good to have during the mutiny," Carol observes.

"Yes, it _would_ have," Garland agrees. "That's probably what Shannon was thinking when she suggested it."

As they walk on, he points out their gristmill, powered by a water wheel. "We grow corn, oats, and barley and grind them there. George Norton? You'll report to the gristmill at 10 AM tomorrow." He leads them by the farm fields and assigns three people to work there after consulting his notes.

Soon, they enter the bustling settlement. Dog comes bounding out of the stables when he spies Daryl and barks and jumps up on him. "Heel!" Daryl orders, and Dog settles down and joins the tour.

Garland points out the outhouses, the schoolhouse, one of "our three greenhouses" and the chapel "which is also our courthouse." Later, he pauses by the barracks. "There are nine empty beds in here." Turning to Carol and Daryl, he explains, "Some of the men moved into the officer's cabins on the ships after the mutiny, and we lost three in that attack Daniel warned us about." He flips open the manila folder. "We can put nine of your single men in here."

"We have ten," Carol says. "Leave out Juan." She says that because Juan has family – a sister and brother-in-law and will likely want to stay with them.

The single men go inside the barracks and toss their packs on empty bunks.

As the tour group walks on, they circle into one of the bulwarks. Carol peers through the open window at the graveyard in the field beyond. The number of crosses has grown by a dozen since she was last here.

"The iron fence boxing this whole thing in," Sarah, the curious knight, asks, "are there gates? Besides the one we came through in front?"

"One on each side and one in the back," Garland replies. "They lock by key from the inside and out."

Garland leads them through the rest of the settlement, past the brewhouse and the store house and the pigs and the goats and another greenhouse. He talks about rations and trading, and then takes them to the Indian Village. They walk past four young children kicking a soccer ball and two more skipping rope. Three men stand smoking in front of their hut, and an elderly couple relaxes in wicker chairs in front of theirs. A woman works in her private garden.

It's nearing sunset, and most people must be done with their jobs for the day. Smoke rises through the holes in the roofs of several of the huts, and with it the scent of cooking fish. Conversation and laughter drifts from open doorways. A dog lies asleep in front of the thatch door of one hut. Some people, curious about the passing tour group, hang out their windows or stand in their doorways. A cat, in response to a call of "Here, kitty, kitty!" darts across the path of the group and disappears.

Carol looks back and counts her still homeless people. "That leaves three couples and Juan."

Garland stops in front of the beaded doorway of the whorehut. "They can stay here."

"With the _whores_?" Daryl growls.

"The council shut it down." Garland parts the beads and leads Daryl and Carol inside. The long hut is portioned into four rooms using free standing room dividers, and in the center is a kitchen area where a circular stone fireplace vents through a hole in the roof. "We got it ready in case of growth, but it's not in use."

"It's as if you were planning for us," Carol says.

"We were planning for _anyone_ ," Garland tells her. "Granted, we thought we'd fill these spaces gradually, over the course of the next year or two, and not all in one day, but…" He shrugs.

"We appreciate the generosity." Carol tells him.

Daryl asks, "What happened to the whores?"

"One of them died of complications from pelvic inflammatory disease," Garland answers. "One married a former client and moved in with him, and he works for her rations, and the other two…now they waitress."

"Waitress?" Carol asks.

"Madam Linda is our liquor distributor. That was Shannon's idea. We let the market ration liquor now. Madam Linda runs a tavern, and she and the two waitresses work and live there. They sleep in the loft."

"Ya ain't afraid they'll drink up the inventory?" Daryl asks.

"Not with Madam Linda in charge. I told you she keeps careful accounts. One of the waitresses – she dried out. The other one still struggles, but uses her tips to supply her habits now. Have your people drop their things, and I'll show y'all."

Garland leads the group beyond the old whorehut to a cabin-like structure with a sign out front that reads, simply, _The Tavern._ "The Tavern's closed at the moment, but it's open six to ten Tuesday through Saturday evening. This is the only distribution point for alcohol in town, unless you scavenge or make and share your own, of course. You pay with tobacco, tea, coffee beans, ammunition, labor, whatever. Prices vary based on supply and demand, so ask the waitresses what the price of the day is when you go in. Whatever you spend here goes into the Jamestown storehouse and pantry. Any tips go to the waitresses and manager, but they also get basic rations for working here." To Carol and Daryl he explains, "The tavern has increased our communal supplies. It motivates people to conserve, to scavenge, and to grow more on their own time so they can spend it here."

"It a topless tavern?" Daryl asks.

Carol rolls her eyes toward him. "And why do you want to know that?"

"Just fig'rd people should know 'fore they walk in there."

"No, it's not," Garland answers, "but I won't say some of the men don't go there to gawk at the waitresses anyway." He turns to address the rest of the Kingdom group. "That about wraps up the tour. Why don't y'all get settled, pick up your rations for the coming week, meet your neighbors, and get a good night's sleep?"

"We get paid in _advance_?" a Kingdom woman asks.

"Yes," Garland replies, "but if you shirk your duty there are fines."

"What if we don't like the job we got assigned?" a Kingdom man grumbles.

"You be grateful for fences and roofs," Edward the plumber tells him, "for fish and fowl, and you shut up and do it."

Garland smiles at that, but he says, "You can apply to the town council for a job transfer. We hold open town halls three times a week in the Council Chambers. Outside the chambers you'll find a sign listing the times for each week. Come by during one of those, state your case, and you may or may not get a transfer. Anyone can come by during one of those town halls and raise any concern." He nods to Sarah. "For instance, if you have suggestions for improvement to security."

After thanking Garland, the people disperse, and Garland takes Carol and Daryl back to his cabin. On the way, he shows them a barren spot of land where Daryl can build. Garland's cabin looks much the same from the outside, except for the new garden boxes that line either side and the freshly built awning that extends from the front door to cover two rocking chairs.

Dog runs straight to the fireplace when they go inside. The canine circles three times on the deer skin rug and then plops down in front of the gently flickering flames. Gary, who looks at least three inches taller than when Carol last saw him, lets go of the car he's running along a bookshelf. Laughing, the three-year-old runs – rather than toddles - over to the rug, saying, "Doggie, doggie, doggie, nice doggie." He falls to his knees before Dog, who jerks up his head to look suspiciously at the boy. Dog turns his head to Daryl, who gives his canine friend a little nod. Dog then proceeds to lick Gary in the face, until the boy topples backward laughing.

"Gentle!" Shannon warns from the kitchen nook, where she's setting the table for dinner. "Pet it gently, Gary!"

"I think the dog's petting him," Garland says.

The cabin's former earthen floor has been overlaid with wood. There's now a stool and a wooden high chair at the kitchen counter, and an extra pot hangs on the wall in the nook. The living room has a second bookcase, with more books as well as board games. There's a fourth gun in the gun rack above the fireplace and a rustic cradle in the far corner of the living room. There's also a new manual ceiling fan hanging in the center of the living room, with pully chains for cranking and powering.

"Carol, y'all take those packs right into Gary's bedroom," Shannon tells her. "There are two twin beds in there. I put fresh sheets on them, and you can push them together to make one big bed. That will be your room until you get your cabin built, so that you can have your privacy. Gary will sleep in our room on the trundle bed."

"What about _your_ privacy?" Carol asks.

"Oh, don't worry." Shannon puts a hand on her protruding belly. "It's the third trimester. Garland's hardly getting any anyway."

Garland closes his eyes.

Carol laughs. "You haven't changed a _bit_."

Daryl and Carol drop their things in Gary's room, and then Shannon invites them to sit down at the table. "I know you're going to be shocked," she tells them, "but we're having fish for dinner."

They drink cold tea lightly sweetened with honey, eat, laugh, and catch up. "I'll cook from now on," Carol says.

"Is my cooking _that_ bad?" Shannon asks.

"No!" Carol insists. "This is great. But you're putting a roof over our heads. I want to contribute. And I'm sure you're exhausted with the pregnancy. Daryl can do the dishes."

Daryl looks up from his plate and chews a little more slowly.

"Excellent," Garland says. "That's usually my job."

When there's a lull in the conversation, Daryl ventures, "Did you…uh…happen to get that recipe 'fore your mama died?"

"For the strawberry pie?" Shannon asks. "Yes, I finally got it out of her, but I tried to make it and... Well, she must have left some secret ingredient out. It's just not the same. But I can make my version for you if you like."

"'M sure yer version's good, too."

"Just don't get your hopes up," Shannon warns him. She turns to Garland. "Any pretty ladies in your tour group today, baby?"

"Several."

"Garland!" Shannon scolds. "You're supposed to say, _None as pretty as you_."

"Hell," Daryl grunts, "even _I_ know that." He pops a broad bean into his mouth using his fingers.

Shannon shakes her head at her husband. "You're going to have to work on your charm, baby. Elections are coming up in July."

Garland shrugs and cuts his fish. "I thought I'd just rely on my record of honesty, dependability, and hard work."

"If only that was all politics required. You have no idea how hard I campaigned for you after the transition." Shannon pulls her glass of tea closer to herself. "So who was the prettiest?"

"Probably Sarah," Garland answers.

"Damn, man," Daryl says. "Makin' me feel like Casanova over here." Carol chuckles.

"Now who's this Sarah?" Shannon asks Carol.

"One of our former knights. She was a solider and a guard."

"Sharp, too," Garland says. "She was making observations about security."

"And did you tell Sarah you were married?" Shannon asks.

"I thought the wedding ring was the giveaway." Garland glances at Daryl's ring finger. "Well, he's still got it."

"What?" Daryl asks.

"Garland bet me you would lose your wedding ring in under one month," Shannon explains. "That you'd take it off and not be able to find it."

"Hell would I take it off for?" Daryl asks.

"Well, Garland takes his off all the time to shoot on the range because he says it messes up his grip. And he takes it off to wash his hands, and to practice his kung fu because he claims it interferes with his _chi_. He's lost his ring _three times_ in the three years we've been married. I keep getting new ones from the box. I told him next time he loses one, he's tattooing my name straight across his forehead."

Carol laughs.

After dinner, Garland wants to show Daryl a new handgun and a new rifle he got off the would-be invaders in the battle Daniel warned them was coming, and Shannon wants to show Carol the phonograph that sits on the window sill next to a stack of old records. "We pinched it from the museum when we found out it actually works, Shannon tells her as she puts on a Beethoven record. "You've got to wind it and wind it, but it plays."

Carol gives it a continuous crank and, eventually, music begins drifting softly from the horn.

When little Gary sees everyone showing off their new toys, he wants to show off his. "Twuck!" he tells Carol, holding up a miniature eighteen wheeler. "Ewaphan!" he tells Daryl, running over to him and shoving a stuffed Elephant into his stomach.

Daryl takes the elephant, hops it on top of Gary's head, and lets out an elephant noise that's a pretty good approximation. The sound makes Carol laugh and Gary's eyes widen. The little boy steps back and looks up at Daryl with surprise.

"That's the noise an elephant makes," Garland explains to him. "He's never heard an elephant before."

"It makes me a little sad," Shannon says, "that he'll never see one in real life. Or any of those zoo animals."

"Who knows," Carol says. "Maybe he will. Ezekiel once had a tiger in the Kingdom."

Garland looks up from the rifle he's just started to disassemble. "A tiger?"

Carol tells him about Shiva.

"Well, let's _hope_ no loose herd of zoo elephants come trampling through Jamestown."

"Gotta all of been eaten by now by walkers," Daryl reasons.

Shannon, tired from the pregnancy, goes to bed early with Gary. Because of all the trouble in the Kingdom and the pilgrimage to Jamestown, Daryl and Carol haven't had sex in over a week, so Carol hints that she's _tired_ , too, but Daryl doesn't notice because he's so busy examining the parts of Garland's new rifle.

Garland, however, _does_ notice. He takes the disassembled barrel of the rifle from Daryl's hands and says, "Hey, Casanova, I think your wife wants you to tuck her in."

[*]

"M' ass is slippin' through this crack," Daryl grumbles and eases away from where the two twin beds are pushed together. They've just had sex, and are warm, a bit sweaty, and trying to get comfortable.

"Why don't we just snuggle in one bed until we're ready to sleep?" Carol suggests. "Then I'll go back to mine to give you space."

"A'ight." Daryl scoots over until he's at the edge of his twin bed and turns on his side so Carol can spoon back against him. He pulls a sheet up over them both, because once they cool off from their lovemaking, the March temperature will chill them.

Carol never does go back to her bed. Safe for the first time in days, behind walls, with a roof over her head, and in her husband's warm embrace, she fades quickly into slumber.


	54. Chapter 54

The sound of Daryl roughly lacing up his boots awakens Carol. She rolls over from the window-side of the room toward him where he sits on the edge of the bed. "Why are you getting dressed so early?"

He ties off his laces, turns, and looks down at her. "They got me huntin' with this deer hunter, Mick or Mickey or Mikey or somethin' like that."

"Well, you should probably learn his actual name."

"Will."

"It's not even sunrise."

"He wants to leave early. Been trackin' this one awhile, outside the gates. What're you doin' today?"

She yawns behind her hand and says, "I'm going to check on all our people and make sure they're settled and don't have any concerns. Then Garland's got me standing watch in that lighthouse for a few hours."

"Sounds borin'."

"I only do it once a week, and it means I get five extra rounds of ammo a week. Tomorrow I do something else. But for now? I'm going back to sleep."

"How's 'bout a quickie first?" Daryl asks as he tugs the sheet down from off her.

She slaps his hand away and pulls the sheet back up. "You got sex last night. And I'm much too tired for that."

"'N how 'bout just a quick handy?"

She laughs. "I thought you had to get to work."

"C'mon. Ya give the best damn handjobs east of the Mississippi."

"Yeah?" she asks. "Who gives the best ones west of the Mississippi?"

"Ah. Ya don't know 'er."

" _You_ don't know her either," she says, laughing. "You've never even _been_ west of the Mississippi." She kisses the hand he's rested against the bed, over his silver wedding ring. "Have a good day, Pookie." Carol rolls over and goes back to sleep.

[*]

The hunter's name turns out to be _Mitch_. He's a scrawny, short-haired black man, so thin Daryl wonders how he survived this long into an apocalypse, but damn can he track. In addition to being able to track, the man doesn't talk much, so Daryl decides he likes him.

Dog comes along for the hunt, sniffing along the deer trail they follow for a mile. Mitch walks with his wooden Winchester rifle in hand and Daryl with his crossbow. They only encounter one walker, which Mitch leaves to Daryl to take out.

Daryl's the first to spy the beautiful, ten-point buck, sipping from a creek. He gets an arrow in its side and neck, but it's Mitch who makes the killing shot to its head as it takes off running.

They field dress the deer and together bring it back to camp and slap it down on the butcher's table, by which time it's noon, and Daryl has already knocked off six of his required twenty hours for the week.

"Can I buy you a bowl of soup and a drink at The Tavern?" Mitch asks him. "It would be an honor."

"'Cause I helped ya catch a deer?" Daryl asks.

"Because you're the hero of the Mutiny of 7 NE."

"Ah. Didn't know the Tavern was open for lunch."

"Noon to three, Wednesday through Sunday. Closed on Mondays. "

"Mhm. Maybe some other time. Gotta cabin to build."

Mitch nods and holds out his hand. Daryl's hand is covered in deer blood, but Mitch doesn't seem to mind, and that makes Daryl like him even more.

Daryl washes up and goes back to Garland and Shannon's cabin, which is empty. He eats a couple of pieces of his jerky rations for the week and a handful of nuts from one of the town's several walnut trees. Then he gets himself a shovel from the settlement's tool shed and goes to work digging a base where Garland showed him he could build.

He's only been digging fifteen minutes when Garland joins him with a shovel of his own and starts digging wordlessly beside him. Daryl appreciates the help, but he's also confused by it. "Ya ain't gettin' paid for this."

"I have some free time."

Daryl throws a shovel full of dirt over his shoulder and glances at Garland. "That beard is bad ass, man. Ya look like Stonewall Jackson."

Garland chuckles. "I'm not sure that's a compliment. He always looked a little crazed to me."

"M'brother Merle always used to say the South will rise again. Seems like it has."

"You don't think people are doing better up north?"

"Pfffft."

"How would you know? Have you ever been north of Virginia since this started?"

"Maryland," Daryl mutters.

"Doesn't count. For all we know, they still have civilization in New York."

"They ain't never had civilization in New York," Daryl replies with a smirk.

"I'm about to let you in on a little secret," Garland tells him as he pushes a cowboy boot down on the blade of his shovel to dig it deeper into the clay. " _I'm_ from New York."

"Like hell! Said ya were a Richmond city detective."

"I was born and bred in New York. But I moved to Virginia for college. I ran out of money, so I dropped out and joined the Richmond PD police academy."

Daryl's confused by this bit of information. Garland looks and sounds every bit the Virginia southern gentleman to him. "But…ya even say _y'all_."

"I've lived in southern Virginia for over twenty years now. One acclimates."

"So ya didn't have to go to college to be a detective?" Daryl asks as he digs.

"Well, I didn't have to in order to be a police officer. But they told me if I really wanted to be competitive enough to get promoted to detective, I should probably get my diploma. So I went back to school, at night, and finished up my degree. Got a B.A. in English Literature."

"To be a _detective_?"

"I just needed to check the college-degree box. I could have got it in underwater basket weaving for all they cared."

"Guess that 'splains the Faulkner novels."

"Hey, I really like Faulkner."

Daryl tosses a shovel full of dirt over his shoulder. "That's fucked up, man, that ya had to go back to school just to get promoted to somethin' ya could already do. All that gate keepin' bullshit. Sometimes 'm glad that world got torn down, and now it ain't who ya know or where ya went to school. 'S just what ya can _do._ "

"Well, it's still who you know, unfortunately," Garland tells him. "Not to minimize your many talents, but why do you think your people got admitted to Jamestown so quickly? Shannon and I vouched for you. And you vouched for your people. They knew you, and you knew us."

"Mhmhm."

They dig silently for a while, until Daryl says, "Gonna get this cabin built soon as I can, so Gary can have his room back 'n you and Shannon can have yers to yerself."

"Well, it's no rush. The baby will be in our room for the first five or six months anyway, until it's sleeping through the night. Don't feel like I'm trying to run you out. To be honest, I kind of like having another man around."

"'Preciate it, brother," Daryl says, and the men go on digging silently together.

 **[*]**

The water's cold but feels great when Daryl dunks his whole head in the washing trough. He flings his head back, half expecting water to splatter everywhere from off his hair. Sometimes he forgets how short it is now. He scrubs his hands next and dries off with one of the three towels hung on an iron bar attached to the wooden trough.

Garland stuck with him for an hour before he left for a council meeting, but now it's after six in the evening, and everyone seems to be heading home for dinner. He trudges to the Barron cabin. When he steps inside, Dog tears himself from Gary's almost full body hug to come greet his master. Daryl lets the dog lick his face but then directs him back to the boy.

Garland is sitting on the couch, reading _As I Lay Dying_ and drinking a shot of whiskey, with Shannon's feet in his lap as she leans back against the opposite arm of the couch and also reads. The title of her book catches Daryl's eye: _Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance._ He wonders what the hell that's about, because it sure doesn't look like a repair guide.

Carol's cooking on the wood stove. Daryl walks over, kisses her neck, and says, "Smells good."

"Me or the stew?" Carol asks.

"Both."

"It'll be ready in about fifteen minutes."

Daryl wanders to the living room, and Garland raises his whiskey glass. "I'd share, but this is my last sip. I got a bottle as a birthday gift from Earl back in January. He found it scavenging. But I've got something better for you." Garland drains his whiskey, sets it with a clunk on the end table, and lifts Shannon's feet off his lap. He wanders into his bedroom and returns with the crossbow from the armory, a bundle of about a dozen bolts, and three unopened packages of strings. "Council says they're yours."

"Well, Merry Christmas to me!" Daryl grins and tries out loading the new crossbow. It's easier to pull back than his own.

Little Gary leaves Dog, runs over, and says, "Gawy pways!"

Daryl draws the crossbow out of his reach. "Nah, kid. Ain't somethin' ya play with. Teach ya to shoot this one when yer bigger." He puts the bow and accessories away in his borrowed bedroom, along with his own bow.

When he returns to the living room, Garland is back on the couch with Shannon, and Gary is back with Dog. The little boy scratches the canine behind his ears while his tail thumps happily. Dog may not want to leave this place once Daryl gets that cabin built.

Garland turns a page of his Faulkner novel. "How can ya stand to read that shit?" Daryl asks him as he slumps down into the unoccupied arm chair.

"Faulkner is definitely an investment," Garland replies. "But like all investments, it pays off."

"Like me, baby?" Shannon asks.

"Well, I got you used and on sale."

Daryl snorts.

Shannon smacks Garland's knee. "Well, _someone's_ not getting laid tonight."

"And that's different from any other night in the past three weeks…how?" Garland asks.

"Hey," Shannon tells him, "you got it good during the second trimester, baby. You've stored up nuts for the winter."

"That's not how that works."

Gary, tired of playing with Dog, runs to one of the bookcases, picks up a little fire truck, and runs back. The boy sets the truck on Daryl's knee, says, "Wooh Wooh Wee Wooh!" and pushes it all the way up his leg, making it move faster and faster as he does so, until he almost drives it straight into Daryl's balls. "Whoa!" Daryl cries, grabbing Gary's had and moving it and the truck up into the air. "Careful, kid!"

"Looks like Gary's found a new play mate," Carol observes with a chuckle from the kitchen.

[*]

Later that night, Carol, with her head on one of Daryl's bare shoulders, traces a heart with a fingertip on his ribcage. He squirms, and she stops, letting her fingers still on his side. "I think Gary's taken a liking to you."

"Mhm. Maybe."

"Does it ever make you sad," she asks, "that you won't be a father?"

Daryl yawns and shifts his head on the pillow. "Least 'm getting' laid."

"It's a serious question." By the time she and Daryl got married, she hadn't had a period in over six months. Now, it's been almsot a year and a half. Menopause was easy for her, not matching the horror stories she'd heard about it in her early forties, but maybe it was fitting that at least _one_ thing in her life be easy. And, strangely, it hasn't seemed to affect her libido at all, or maybe it has and she just doesn't know because, for the first time in her life, she really enjoys sex. Maybe she'd be dragging Daryl to bed three times a day if she were forty again.

"Rather be an uncle anyhow. Uncles get to do all the cool shit with none of the blame."

"You're going to miss Hershel and Judith, aren't you?"

"See 'em in November, if we take a road trip for that trade fair."

"We will. I want to see Henry. And the others. See that they've settled well."

"'S make ya sad?" Daryl asks. "That ya can't? Have a baby?"

"No. I lost Sophia. I lost Mika and Lizzie. I've had more than my share of children and tragedy. Henry turned out well. He's safe. He's becoming a man. I don't think I'd want to start that all over now. It's too much like having your heart walking around outside your body." She raises her head to peer down at him. "But I bet we'd make beautiful babies."

"Damn right," he agrees. "'N they'd be strong, too. Tough as nails."

"And smart. They'd be geniuses."

"'N great hunters and archers."

"Master chefs. And always polite and respectful."

"Mhmh," Daryl agrees. "Our kid's'd be perfect."

"And we'd be the perfect parents."

They both snort.

"C'mere," he murmurs.

She slides up a little, and he kisses her tenderly before she turns off the oil lamp and they settle into sleep.


	55. Chapter 55

Either Garland thinks Carol is a jack of all trades, or he's trying to figure out where she best fits, because she has a different work assignment every day this week. Today, she's supposed to meet two men at the west gate to help them inspect and clean the side and back fences. Jamestown has wooden pikes running through the gaps between the iron bars of their fence, positioned at an angle, so the walkers get speared on them if they come too close. They check those pikes twice a week.

When she walks beyond the graveyard toward the awaiting men, one of them, a thirty-something redhead, mutters to the other, "That's Carol Stuart? She doesn't look anything like her sketch. Not nearly as hot."

"Carol _Dixon_ ," Carol calls to them, and the redheaded flushes to discover he's been overheard from such a distance.

When she reaches them, the other man says, "I apologize for the rudeness of my co-worker. I'm Dante, and you look _fantastic_." He holds out his hand to her, and smiling, she shakes it. He reminds Carol a little of T-Dog in skin tone and build and because of his bald head, but his face is more attractive than T-Dog's was, and he has a goatee like Morgan once wore. Suddenly, she misses those two men who once saved her life, in two different places, in two different times, when she was two different people. Dante points to the redhead. "And this jackass is Arnie."

Arnie waves to her apologetically before unlocking the gate with a key. He locks it again on the other side when they're out.

They walk for about a half a mile and eventually near a walker that's caught up on one of the pikes. "It's mine," Arnie says as he draws his knife. He strolls cockily toward the creature. When he's still a few feet from it, Carol throws her knife. It twirls through the air and thunks straight in the walker's left eye, sending the growling creature into a dead slump.

Dante laughs, and Arnie's shoulders fall. Still chuckling, Dante strolls past Arnie and removes Carol's knife. He brings it back to her, lying it across his open hands, like a royal offering. "Nice throw," he says with a smile as she takes it back.

The two men peel the walker off the pike, and then Dante checks the wood for soundness. It's splintered. He fishes a little notebook and pencil out of his front pocket and murmurs, "Section 17, Number 5" as he write it down.

They make a complete loop to the west gate, finding only three more walkers caught up. If they clean these fences twice weekly, Carol thinks, they must not draw more than ten walkers a week, even with the occasional shooting on the practice range. All of that work "fighting back the cannibal hordes" in the first two years of Jamestown must have paid off.

The job takes three hours, and most of that is just walking and looking at the fence. Dante seems more interested in testing the strength of various pikes than in slaying anything, but Carol lets Arnie kill one of the creatures, while she takes out the other two.

"I don't understand why you need three people for this job," Carol says as Arnie fishes out his gate key.

"We don't," Dante replies. "Garland must be considering replacing Arnie with you."

"And putting me back on outhouse duty for those six hours?" Arnie grumbles. "Goddamnit!"

While Arnie unlocks the east gate, Dante smiles at Carol. "Can I buy you a drink at The Tavern sometime?"

"You _do_ know I'm married, right?" she asks.

"It's just a drink," Dante says.

"And you know who she's married _to_ ," Arnie reminds him. "The guy who took down six navy men, two of them _at once_."

Dante's smile fades.

 **[*]**

After trying out his new crossbow on the hunt, Daryl decides it won't become his go-to, but he does like it. It's just not as familiar as his own arm to him. He uses it on a squirrel, and again on a stray walker in the woods that they find feasting on their wounded deer when they finally catch up to it. "Fuck," Daryl mutters. "We still get credit for the hours if we don't catch shit?"

"Sure," Mitch replies. "We've been tracking. It's all part of the job. If you don't come back with anything for too long, the council will assume you're bad at your job and reassign you. But they know we can't catch something _every_ day. And there are other hunters."

"Good." Daryl wants time to work on that cabin, after all.

"How about that lunch and drink today?" Mitch asks. "At the Tavern? On me?"

"Sorry, nah, gotta cabin to build."

When they get back to Jamestown, Daryl resumes digging the base.

[*]

"I think maybe I got hit on today," Carol says that evening at the Barron family dinner table. Gary has already been fed and is playing with his cars.

Daryl narrows his eyes. "What?"

"Who?" Shannon asks.

"Dante," Carol murmurs as she takes a bite of the spinach she cooked up in sored bacon grease.

"Well, he _is_ a charmer," Shannon says.

"Hell is this Dante asshole?" Daryl grumbles.

"He works repairing the pikes on the fence," Garland says. "He sawed and shaped all those pikes. He used to be a lumberjack before the Great Sickness."

"He ain't married?" Daryl asks.

"No," Garland replies.

"But he's no trouble at all, is he, baby?" Shannon asks.

"Just the one time."

"What one time?" Daryl wants to know.

"Dante was just having a little Friday night fun," Shannon insists.

"He was streaking naked and drunk through the entire settlement," Garland says, "singing 'You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman' at the top of his lungs."

Carol shuts her lips tight to hold in her laugh so she won't spit out her water. After she swallows it down, she coughs.

"That was always Garland's _favorite_ part of being sheriff," Shannon tells them. "Putting drunks in the drunk tank. Although I don't know why you felt the need to lock up poor Dante, baby. He wasn't hurting anybody."

"It was the best and safest place for him to sleep it off. Besides, women and children don't need to be exposed to that sort of thing."

"Well, I don't think you heard any of the women complaining once they got a gander."

Given the glowers of both Daryl and Garland, Carol thinks it's best to change the subject. "Do you have any use for our tobacco? We each got half an ounce for our weekly rations." Combined, that has to be enough for forty cigarettes. "But Daryl doesn't smoke anymore."

"Oh, honey, hold onto that," Shannon tells her. "It's like _gold_ in Jamestown. The smokers are always willing to trade for it. The only thing better is unspoiled Old World liquor." She looks at Garland pointedly over her plate.

"I wasn't about to trade away my _birthday present_ , Shannon. That would have been _rude_."

"All I'm saying," Shannon tells him, "is that I could have bought maid service for a full month with that whiskey, and then maybe I wouldn't be so _tired_ , if you know what I mean."

"Does Dante smoke?" Daryl asks.

"He smelled like he did," Carol says.

"Hell ya _smellin'_ 'em for?" Daryl grumbles.

Shannon laughs. "It's kind of hard not to when you're standing right next to him. He smokes like a chimney. Why do you ask?"

"'Cause I think I know what to do with that tobacco. Could use a lumberjack to help me make some logs. How many hours ya think he'd give me for a whole ounce of tobacco?"

"Quite a few," Garland says.

Gary runs up to the table and sets a police car right next to Daryl's plate. "Car hungwy!"

Daryl spears a piece of rabbit on his fork, holds it out to the front of the car as if feeding it, and says, "Nom nom nom nom nom."

Gary laughs in an all-out boy-giggle, and pretty soon, Daryl's laughing, too.

 ** _[*]_**

Carol awakens to the sound of birds chirping. She drags herself into a sitting position and sees Daryl standing shirtless before the small, circular mirror on the wall. He strokes his goatee, which has finally grown back since his bet with Jerry. 

"Admiring yourself?" she asks.

He turns. "Thinkin' of growin' a full beard. Like Garland."

"No."

"Hell not? Think his looks bad ass. 'N he said I should grow one."

"Did he now?" Carol, wearing only the tank top and panties she slept in last night, eases to the edge of the bed. Her bare feet are chilly against the wood floor. "I think you have a bit of man crush on Garland."

"Man crush? Fuck's that? Ain't got no man crush. Just wanna beard like his."

"I prefer the goatee."

"Well you ain't got to wear it."

"Well, _you_ don't have to feel it between your legs. And you don't sleep with Garland, so…" She shrugs. "I think you should take my opinion under advisement."

"Yeah?" He turns, prowls toward her, and pushes her back down on the bed, with her feet still on the floor. "Ya like the way it feels 'tween yer legs?" He kneels near her feet and tugs her panties all the way off. "That what ya like?" Daryl wraps her legs around his neck and kisses the inside of her thigh. "Hmmm…m'Carol? That what ya like?"

She bites her bottom lip and digs her nails into his shoulders.

"Hmm?" he trails kisses down the inside of her leg, and then up the inside of her other leg, and nips at her thigh. "That what ya like?"

"Yes. _Please_."

He turns his head and flicks his tongue out against her clit. Carol jerks up off the bed.

When her bottom comes back down, she digs her fingers into the strands of his short hair at the top of his head and pushes him back to the spot. "Again," she orders.

He obeys, and this time she only jerks her hips in a circle.

"Slow and steady now," she breathes. "Ohh…yeah…good…ohhh….like that…."

Daryl follows her instructions until she's shuddering. Then he kisses his way up her body, pushing her tank top up as he does so, and dragging it off over her head. "My turn," he growls as he stands and drops his sweat pants to reveal his erection. He lowers himself over her and, while she's still trembling slightly, pushes himself inside, moaning, "Sweet, sweet Carol…"

[*]

After her pleasant morning wake-up call, Carol checks in on all her people and is confident they're settling well. Three of the single Kingdom women _already_ have Jamestown boyfriends, which she supposes is not all that surprising. They have a much larger menu of single men to choose from in Jamestown than they did in the Kingdom.

As she's walking out of the museum, she pauses and looks at the map on the wall. The James River, she notices, flows all the way to the Chesapeake Bay. Oceanside is situated along that Bay. She wonders if the river is navigable the whole way. She files the question away in her mind, figuring she'll ask if she runs into one of the navy officers. But today, she's supposed to be helping the veterinarian, since she learned a lot from Hershel, though she mostly learned it for use on _humans_.

She enjoys chatting with the veterinarian about her work on the council as they check on a sick cow and then a horse. Carolyn tells her that being a councilwoman probably requires fifteen to twenty hours a week, but only counts for ten in terms of rations. "People don't want a professional political class anymore. So we all still have to work at other jobs, too."

"Are you running for reelection in July?" Carol asks her.

"I think so. There's just not enough women in the government, and I stand a good chance of staying on."

"Do you think Garland will be mayor again?"

"The mayor is chosen a day after the council election," Carolyn explains, "from among the nine elected council members, in a follow-up election. Council members can decline to be on the ballot for mayor, and last year, we all did, except Garland and David."

"David?"

"Captain David Cummings. David didn't expect to win. He just wanted to get a feel for his support. But I think he's making a more serious bid this year. "

"Do you think he'd make a good mayor?" Carol asks.

"He'd make an acceptable one, but I'm voting for Garland again. Council members can serve up to seven one-year terms total, but the mayor is limited to only three. So, eventually, I'll probably vote for David." She smiles. "If I'm not running against him. But I'm not throwing my hat in that ring until Garland's stepped out of it."

Between her guard standing, fence cleaning, and animal tending, Carol's knocked out ten of her twenty hours for the week. So in the late afternoon, she offers to help Shannon in her private garden box, where the pregnant woman is doing some light watering with a can. "Besides the council," Carol asks her as she plucks weeds, "what are you doing for work?" She's still getitng a feel for how Jamestown operates.

"They have me on light duty because of the pregnancy," Shannon replies. "I fulfill my other ten hours verifying inventory. It's insanely boring, but it's not physical."

"Have you picked out a name yet?" Carol asks. "For the baby?"

"Bonnie Ellen if it's a girl, after my mama and Garland's late sister. Ivan Daryl if it's a boy, after my father, and after _your_ Daryl. Garland's idea. He wanted to honor the man who saved his life."

Carol can't wait to tell Daryl that, if Garland hasn't already. "How's the pregnancy progressing?"

"Swimmingly, according to Dr. Ahmad. Garland's pretty excited, I have to say. He's been an excellent father to Gary, but something about having one that's going to look like him…I don't know. It's got him strutting around like a peacock."

"He's not frustrated over not _getting any_?" Carol teases.

"Oh, I was exaggerating," Shannon tells her. "I stop by the mayor's office twice a week, lock the door, pull the blinds, and give him a quick BJ." Carol laughs, even though she's growing accustomed to the oversharing. "Because you know how men get when they go too long without a little release." Shannon tilts her watering can over the beets. "Garland gets real grouchy after four days. Doesn't Daryl?"

Carol tosses a handful of weeds in the compost bag. "Back in the Kingdom, Daryl used to be gone for a week at a time sometimes, to lead our trade team. He was never irritable when he got back. But he also _needs_ to roam, or he _does_ get irritable."

"Y'all have an open marriage?" Shannon asks in shock.

"What? No! I mean, physically, he needs to roam. He needs to go out and hunt, or go out on supply runs, or go out with the trade team."

"Oh, phew," Shannon says. "I mean, not that there's anything wrong with that, if that's what a couple _chooses_ to do. But me? I'd cut a bitch if she touched _my_ man."

Carol laughs.

"Wouldn't you?" Shannon asks.

"I'd trust Daryl to handle it if someone came onto him."

"And you wouldn't confront her?" Shannon asks skeptically. "Even if she _knew_ y'all were married?"

"I don't think so."

"I wish I had your aplomb," Shannon tells her.

"My _aplomb_? I don't think I've ever heard anyone use that word in real life."

"It's on my word of the day calendar today."

"Calendar?" Carol asks. "From what year?"

" _This_ year. Some of the kids made them in school to practice vocabulary and gave them as gifts to all the council members."

"Are you running for re-election in July?" Carol asks her.

"I don't think so. Not with the baby coming in May. I don't want to put on my politician face when I'm dealing with no sleep and diapers and breast feeding. I'll probably take a year off and then run again the following year." That's a shame, Carol thinks. Unless another woman steps up, that could mean the council could drop down to only two women. "How about you?"

"How about me what?" Carol asks.

"Are _you_ running for Town Council in July?"

"Me?" Carol asks in surprise. They _just_ got here. July is only a little over three months away. Who would vote for such a newcomer?

"Why not? You'll be a full citizen by the end of April. After that, you can run for anything. And, I mean, you used to be a _Queen_. So I suppose you know a thing or two about governance. And let's face it, you've got a lot of name recognition."

Carol pushes down some fertilizer into the soil and contemplates Shannon's unexpected suggestion.


	56. Chapter 56

Daryl hunts with Mitch for a few hours in the morning, and when he gets back to Jamestown, he trades his and Carol's weekly tobacco rations for Dante's help.

"How 'bout this one?" Daryl asks as they stop in front a tree in the designated lumber area.

"You don't want that. The log diameter is too dissimilar at the two ends."

Daryl represses the rumble in his throat. This is the fifth tree Daryl's suggested that the man has shot down. But Dante was a lumberjack in the old world, and Daryl's learned to take instruction where he can find it.

A few minutes later, they finally find a tree Dante deems usable. "'S too short," Daryl says. "Won't make many logs."

"But it will make good ones."

They fell it together. Then they saw off the branches. "I can use some of those for replacement pikes for the fence," Dante notes. After sawing the trunk into logs, Dante says, "You need to seal the ends as soon as possible."

"Know that."

"I'd use laytex paint. We've got some in storage. The council doesn't charge for it. Just sign it out." Dante sits down on the tree stump and rolls a cigarette. "You smoke?"

"Not anymore." Quitting wasn't a conscious choice. Daryl just ran out of cigarettes that didn't disintegrate at his touch. Nobody grew tobacco in the allied communities, and this is the first time he's had access to smokable cigarettes in years. He's awfully tempted, but here in Jamestown, that would be like lighting hundred dollar bills on fire.

"Good for you." Dante lights up. "It's an expensive habit." He gestures with his cigarette to the pile of logs they've produced. "You know, it's really better to be doing this in winter when the sap content is lower."

"Can't wait 'til winter. 'S ten months away."

"So I take it you aren't drying the logs for six to twelve months either?"

Daryl shakes his head. "Gonna build wet."

"They'll shrink."

"Know. Gonna use a green log buildn' system that allows for shrinkage 'n settlement. 'N 'm gonna use chinkin' 'tween the logs. Anytime they move, just reapply more."

"Sounds like you know what you're doing. But even with that…I'd give them a month in the sun first."

"I will," Daryl says. "'S Why I want to get 'em cut as soon as possible. Can ya help me cut down another tree today?"

"It's almost dinner time. And I'm not sawing up an entire second tree for just that one ounce."

"Just help me bring it down. Saw it m'self."

"Three rounds of ammo," Dante says. "To fell the second tree. That's enough for a pint at the Tavern."

"Hope ya don't think yer buyin' my wife that pint," Daryl growls.

Dante tilts his head up and coolly blows a stream of smoke into the air. "She told you I offered to buy her a drink?"

"Mhmhm."

"I was just being polite. Polite and grateful. Carol's new here, we were working together, and she killed that traitorous commander before he had a chance to kill Shannon. So I just wanted to say thank you."

Daryl looks at him through narrowed, suspicious eyes.

"We cool?" Dante asks.

"Will be, when ya fell that tree."

"I will, for three rounds of nine millimeter."

"Tell ya what. Since ya was gonna spend three rounds to buy a drink for m'wife just to tell 'er _thank you_ , why don't ya cut down that tree for free, and I'll by 'er a drink 'n tell 'er it was from you?"

Dante sighs. "Fine. But take a breather, man."

Daryl does. He unscrews the top of his canteen and takes a few swigs as he watches Dante finish his cigarette, but as soon as the man stubs it out beneath his thick, tan work boots, Daryl jerks his head toward the trees. "C'mon."

[*]

After dinner, Carol sits in the rocking chair and sews a fresh patch onto the ripped-out knee of Daryl's pants. "How did you tear it this time?" she asks.

Daryl, who's sitting in the armchair, works wax into the strings of his bow. "Got it caught up on a tree branch."

Shannon's hand falls open and her book slides to the floor as she drifts off to sleep against Garland's shoulder on the couch. Garland turns a page of one of his volumes of _Gun Digest_. "Which do you think is a better deer rifle, Daryl? The Ruger American or the Weatherby Vanguard Series 2?"

"Like the longer barrel on the Weatherby," Daryl replies.

"Me, too. And I don't like the tang safety on the Ruger. I had one that was always getting bumped off."

"I like the accuracy of the Weatherby," Carol chimes in, just to remind Garland that she knows her guns, too.

"Accuracy has more to do with the shooter than the weapon," Garland says.

"Well, I'm an accurate shooter."

"I'm aware," Garland replies. "I saw that tight group you shot on the practice range today."

Daryl looks up from his bow. "Ya wasted ammo at the range?"

"I worked as the range safety officer today," Carol replies, "so I figured I'd take a turn."

"Ammo's like money here," Daryl tells her. "Ya can buy all sorts of shit with it."

"I know, but I haven't had a chance to practice target shooting because the Kingdom didn't have all these reloading supplies."

"She's required to practice once a week anyway," Garland says, "if she's going to be a guard, a fence cleaner, or a range safety officer. She gets five extra rounds for that purpose."

"Sounds like ya used a lot more 'n yer five practice rounds," Daryl mutters.

"I did. This _one_ time."

Daryl hears the perturbed tone in her voice and drops it.

She pokes the needle into the patch and asks Garland, "So am I just going to keep switching jobs?"

"Which did you like most?" he asks.

"To be honest, standing guard in the lighthouse was boring. There aren't any walkers to shoot, and nothing comes up or down that river except Jamestown's ships and boats. Cleaning the fence was more interesting, because I at least got to kill some walkers. I enjoyed working with Carolyn, but I really trained under Hershel to use those skills on _humans_ , not animals. And I don't really like yelling at people for safety infractions. I got enough opportunity to do that being a mother."

Garland chuckles.

"So I'd rather you just put me wherever you feel you most need me."

"I'm going to put you permanently on fence cleaning, then. Dante says you're more efficient at killing cannibals than Arnie, and he'd rather work with you."

"Bet he would," Daryl grumbles.

"I can handle Dante," Carol assures him.

"But that will only be twice a week, three hours each time," Garland says. "So for your other fourteen hours, why don't you try patrol next week? That at least involves moving around, and we all know how observant you are when it comes to things being… _off_."

"That sounds good to me," Carol replies.

"Once you're a citizen, Earl will deputize you, and you'll have the authority to make formal arrests when needed. But for now, just be eyes and ears on patrol, and send for another deputy if someone's up to something."

"Did you hear that?" Carol asks Daryl. "I'm going to be a deputy."

"Deputy Dixon," Daryl says with a smirk.

Shannon snorts awake and asks, "What did you do with my book, baby?" .

"You dropped it on the floor when you nodded off."

Shannon bends down, scoops up her book, and finds her place again.

Little Gary gets some game called Hi-Ho-Cherry-O from the second bookcase and says, "Unca Dahwall pways." It's a minute before Daryl even realizes the kid is talking about _him_ , but he sets aside his crossbow, leaves his tin of wax on the arm of the chair, and slides down onto the floor to play. He hasn't been called _uncle_ since his last trade trip before winter, when he got to see Judith at Alexandria and Hershel at the Hilltop. He wonders if Shannon or Garland called him Uncle Daryl to Gary, or if the kid just came up with it on his own.

The boy opens the game and puts a bunch of little plastic cherries in the holes on two trees and sits cross legged before the board with one hand on Dog's back. "Go!" he orders Daryl.

"How ya play?"

"Spin the spinner," Garland tells him as he turns a page, "and whatever number it lands on, take that many apples from your tree."

"They're cherries, baby," Shannon corrects him.

Garland ignores the correction. "The first one who gets all their apples in their bushel wins."

"'S a dumb ass game," Daryl mutters.

"He's _three_ ," Garland says. "It's amazing he can count already."

"Daryl's just afraid he's going to lose," Carol teases as she tugs on her needle to tighten the thread.

"You never played that game as a boy?" Shannon asks him.

"Didn't have no games 'n my house. 'Cept darts. But m'brother just drew the dart board on the wall." Daryl leans over and spins. "Hell's it mean if it lands on a dog?"

"You have to put two apples back in your apple tree," Garland explains. "If you have any apples missing from it."

" _Cherries_ , baby. They're clearly cherries."

"Genetically mutated monster cherries, perhaps," Garland replies, and Carol chuckles as she pokes her needle back into Daryl's pants. "Look at the size of those things relative to the trees and the bushel."

"It's not Hi-Ho-Apple-Oh," Shannon insists.

"So I don't get to do _nothin'_?" Daryl asks.

"I'm afraid not," Garland tells him. "Not this turn."

"Dumbass game."

Gary flicks the spinner hard. It goes whirling around and lands on the picture with three cherries. "Yes!" the three-year-old says and fumbles to pick up three cherries and put them in the bushel.

"Ya got four," Daryl tells him.

"Well he's not very coordinated at this age," Carol says. "Just let it go, Pookie."

Daryl does, not even blushing at the nickname anymore. Shannon and Garland have both heard it by now, and they've yet to make fun of him for it. He spins again. "Hell's it mean if it lands on a bird?"

Garland chuckles. "It means you put two apples back in the tree."

"But that's what the damn dog meant!" Daryl grumbles, and Dog barks, and Carol laughs.

 ** _[*]_**

The next day, Carol cleans the fences with Dante again. The practice firing range is only open two days a week, and they clean the _following_ two days, because the shooting sometimes draws walkers out of the woods. Dante's brought a replacement pike with him that he must have cut and shaped since the last time they cleaned. "Looks like it's just you and me from now on. The dynamic duo. Think you can handle it?"

"As long as you don't sing Aretha while we do it," Carol says as she swings open the gate for him.

"Oh. God. You heard about that?"

Carol nods as she locks the gate behind them.

"It was not my finest moment," Dante admits. "But in my defense, I was new to Jamestown. I'd only been here a month, and I wasn't aware of how strong that moonshine was."

They don't encounter any walkers between the gate and the broken pike, though Carol keeps an eye on the tree line as they walk in case any should emerge. She helps Dante replace the pike, and then they move on. "Did your husband give you that thank you drink from me?"

"What thank you drink?"

"He offered to pay me three rounds to fell a second tree, and I told him he could keep those three rounds and use them to buy you a thank you drink from me."

"He didn't mention it."

Dante shrugs. "Well, I guess he must have drunk it himself."

"I'm sure he didn't," Carol says. Daryl's hoarding those rounds so he can buy more labor, most likely, and she doesn't blame him. He's been working himself to exhaustion in the few days they've been here.

She gets to kill four walkers today, one coming out of the woods and not even caught up on a pike. She's glad for the practice. She could get soft living in a camp as well guarded and secured as Jamestown.

[*]

Later that afternoon, Daryl is hard at work on the cabin sizing and sawing logs. He's already knocked out his twenty for the week, and Carol knows he's been at it since the morning. She makes him a glass of cold lemonade using her frozen one-ounce ration of lemon juice for the week and half of her sugar ration and brings it to him where he works.

As she walks toward the building site, Carol finds Daryl has an audience. Two women sit on a flat bench a few yards away, watching him work and whispering to each other between giggles. Their eyes are _all over_ Carol's man. Of course, her man _is_ a sight to see. He's shed his long sleeve shirt and the arms of his white undershirt are ripped off. The muscles of his tan shoulders and biceps glisten with sweat, and his ass is on display as he bends over to throw himself into the sawing.

Well, Carol thinks, if those women want a show, she'll give them one. She strolls over, runs her hand over the seat of his pants, and squeezes. He stands straight in surprise, leaving the saw lodged in the wood.

"Lemonade?" Carol asks.

"Thanks." He drains it thirstily.

Carol takes the empty glass from his hand, hooks a finger into the beltloop of his work pants, and drags him close for a kiss. He receives it happily enough at first, but when he threatens to pull away from her, she trails her lips up to his ear and does something she knows for a fact drives him crazy – which is to rake her teeth over his earlobe in just such a way…

Daryl groans, crushes his lips back down on hers, and thrusts his tongue inside. He tastes bitter sweet from the tart lemonade. With the cool, empty glass still in one hand, Carol squeezes his arm with the other. When he comes up for breath, she says, "The Barron cabin is empty. Wanna screw around?"

"Hell yeah."

As they walk toward the cabin, he puts a hand on the small of her back to urge her on. Carol glances over her shoulder at the women on the spectator's bench. One appears disappointed, and the other looks downright jealous. Maybe she didn't use a knife, but Carol thinks maybe she just cut a bitch anyway. Shannon would be proud.


	57. Chapter 57

Once they're in their bedroom, Daryl yanks off his undershirt. "Sorry I ain't showered."

"I don't mind a sweaty man _sometimes_ ," Carol assures him as she wraps her arms around his neck and inhales his musky, masculine scent. She kisses his ear and whispers into it, "Tell me what you want."

He blinks in surprise, probably because that's usually _his_ line. She's let it be his line, perhaps, for too long. It's been fantastic learning how good sex can feel for her if she just describes what she wants, and with her history of abuse, it's not easy being vulnerable enough to open herself up to blanket requests. "I _want_ to do what you want," she assures him. "Just tell me."

He draws away, and his eyes have darkened. His voice is husky soft when he says, "Undress for me. Real slow."

It makes her blush, but she does, shedding her clothes a little at a time while his eyes flit over every inch of her. When she's naked before him, he tells her to sit on the bed, and he walks over to stand in front of her.

Carol feels a bit exposed because he's got his pants on and she's stark naked. She's puzzled when he takes one of her hands and suckles each of her four fingers. It feels good, and there's something strangely sexy about his intensity when he does it, but he's never done that before. "Lie back," he orders, and she does, with her feet on the floor. She realizes he made her fingers wet for lubricant when he says, "Spread yer legs open, 'n then touch yerself. Wanna watch ya play."

That's not something she's ever done in front of a man, and her flesh grows warm with embarrassment, but she closes her eyes to shut out the shyness and does what he asks.

"Like that?" he asks. "Feel good?"

" _Yes_." It does. She knows her own body after all. It's embarrassing and exciting at the same time.

The clang of his belt buckle coming undone sends a small shiver up her back. "Now use yer other hand on yer tits. Play with 'em for me." She cups one of her breasts with her own hand, and then the other. His zipper rasps down. "That's a good girl. Pinch yer nipples for me. Mhmmm…." His buckle clinks as his pants fall to the floor. "Yeah, make m' good 'n hard." The mattress shifts. He's closer now, on the bed beside her, probably lying sideways to watch. His breath is hot on her neck, and his voice is raspy deep when he says, "That's a good girl. Play." His warm lips come down on her bare shoulder. "Mhmmm…" It's all in his throat, that pleased murmur. "Is m'Carol getting' good n' wet?"

"Yes." She shivers, some from the pleasure she's giving herself, and some from the excitement of knowing she's turning him on.

"Beautiful," he murmurs, "sexy, naughty girl. Keep goin'. Play."

She can hear his breath thicken, and her own picks up as, eyes closed, she continues to touch herself beneath his hot gaze.

She's close to cuming when the bed shifts again, suddenly. She opens her eyes to find him over her, holding himself up by his arms.

His eyes meet hers. "Ya ready for me?"

Biting her bottom lip, she nods and moves her hand away from between her legs.

As he pushes in, he groans, "Awwwww….holy…fuck…. _Carol._ "

It's quick from there, a few hard thrusts and grunts followed by a hot explosion and strangled cry of pleasure. He throws himself on his back and apologizes for his early finish.

"I guess that really wound you up, huh?" she teases.

"M'sorry. Shouldn't of waited so long." He rolls on his side and kisses her. "Want me to touch ya?"

She nods, and he slides his hand between her legs to finish her off while they kiss. It's only a small pop and shudder this time, but she doesn't mind. She's happy because she was able to give him something he clearly wanted, something he's probably wanted for a long time but never dared ask for. "Did you have fun?" she whispers.

He smiles dopily. "Hell of a lotta."

[*]

Daryl's drifting off, half conscious, fuzzily wondering what the hell he did to get so lucky this afternoon, when Garland's voice sounds in the living room: "Daryl, are you in here?"

"Shit," Daryl mutters, and bolts upright. He pulls on his clothes hastily. Meanwhile, Carol crawls under the sheets and curls up to sleep.

Daryl notices his zipper is down when he emerges from the bedroom and tugs it up quickly. "Yeah?" he asks Garland as he clicks the door shut behind himself.

"You can't leave your tools unattended on your building site. The little kids go out there to play, run around, and the teacher can't watch them all every second."

"Oh, shit. 'M sorry. Got distracted. 'M goin' back right now."

"I put them back in the tool shed already. Just don't do it again."

"Someone get hurt?"

"A kid cut himself on the saw. Nothing serious. Just a little cut. He's all patched up. And I suppose he'll learn from it."

"Man, 'm – "

"-Just don't do it again. Problem solved. Want some help?"

"With the cabin?" Daryl asks, and when Garland nods, he says, " _Love_ some help."

"I've only got an hour," Garland tells him, "but I'll do what I can. Have you seen Carol? Shannon was looking for her."

"Uh…'S takin' a nap."

"Ah. I see..." Garland chuckles. "We used to make good use of our afternoons, too. I can't wait until this baby is born and is sleeping through the night." Daryl is following him out the door when he says, "You know, if it's a boy, we're naming it after you. Well, you and Shannon's father. Ivan Daryl. Did Carol tell you?"

Daryl's too stunned to speak. "Nah…" he manages finally. "Must of forgot."

"Well, I hope you don't mind."

"Hell would I _mind_?" Daryl grins. "Van Daryl. 'S awesome, man. Sounds like a royal redneck."

Garland smirks. "Van Daryl sounds like a vampire slayer in a comic book."

"'S gonna be weird, though, when he's a baby. Can't call a _baby_ Van Daryl."

"Well, we weren't actually planning on _Van Daryl_. I think Shannon will end up calling him Ivan. Unless she's angry. And then he'll be _Ivan Daryl Barron, come here this minute_! Of course, it could be a girl."

"Whatchya gonna call it then?"

"Bonnie Ellen. I don't much care for _Bonnie_ , to be honest, but, I wasn't going to fight Shannon over honoring her mother. I wasn't entirely thrilled with _Ivan_ , either, to be honest. I'm not sure why I got to choose the middle names, and she got to choose the first ones."

"Well, she is the one carryin' it round for nine months n' givin' birth to it. 'N feedin' it from 'er tits."

"Fair point."

By now they're at the tool shed and Daryl gets the two-man buck saw, since he has help. Together they head to work on the cabin.

 **[*]**

It's only his sixth night in Jamestown, but Daryl's already gotten used to these quiet evenings by the fire, with Garland and Shannon snuggled on the couch, Carol sitting in the rocking chair and sewing, reading, or sharpening her knives, and Gary playing with Dog on the deerskin rug between them. At the moment, Daryl's sitting in the armchair and stripping off a damaged fletching from one of his crossbow bolts in order to replace it with a new one.

Gary stands up and runs over toward his armchair. Daryl blocks him with his left arm before the boy can grab the bolt. "Ain't a toy," Daryl tells him.

"Pway! Unca Dahwall, pwease pway!"

"Get a game 'n I'll play with ya when 'm done with this."

Gary smiles and runs to the bookcase. Little kids always run like drunks, Daryl thinks, and Gary almost stumbles into Carol's rocking chair on the way.

"Who's your celebrity freebie, Carol?" Shannon asks.

The sharpening stone rasps over the blade of Carol's knife. "My what?"

"Garland and I have agreed we each get one free pass to have sex with a celebrity if they happen to have survived the apocalypse and show up at the gates of Jamestown. Mine's Tom Cruise."

"You wouldn't look at Tom Cruise twice if he wasn't a famous actor," Garland tells her. "You know he's only five foot seven?"

"Just because I married a tall man doesn't mean I don't find short men attractive."

"5'7" ain't _short_ ," Daryl insists. "'S average!"

"Daryl's 5'10"," Carol explains. "He likes to think he's tall."

"Well Garland's 6'1"." Shannon pats his knee. "But _that's_ not why I'm attracted to you, baby."

"Who's Garland's freebie?" Carol asks.

"Nicole Kidman," Shannon tells her. "Garland's got a thing for redheads. Lucky me I guess."

"She's blonde," Garland says as he turns a page of his book.

"She dyes it. She's a redhead by birth." Shannon fluffs her red curls. "I don't know why you'd ruin that color by dying it _blonde_."

"I used to have reddish brown hair when I was younger," Carol says. "It went gray before I was thirty-six, and I just decided to run with it."

"Well it looks great," Shannon assures her. "That's a beautiful shade."

Daryl looks up from fiddling with his bolt and tries to picture her with reddish-brown hair. He can't.

"Didn't they used to be married?" Carol asks. "Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise? Your celebrity freebies were married to each other?"

"They got divorced though," Shannon says. Turning to Garland, she asks. "Is that a bad omen, baby? That our celebrity freebies got divorced? You'd never divorce _me_ , would you?"

"If I did, you'd probably work your magic in court, and you'd get the cabin and everything in it down to the very last bullet in my revolver."

"You're right. I'd make it a lot of trouble for you. It's probably easier if you just keep tolerating me."

"Who's your celebrity freebie?" Carol asks Daryl.

"I ain't dumb enough to play this game."

"Oh, come on," Carol insists. "Play along."

"Fine," Daryl mutters. "Audrey Hepburn." He peers up to see Carol's reaction, and she appears to be mulling it over.

"Oh, Daryl's clever," Shannon says. "Because she's long dead. Baby, _you_ should have thought of picking a long dead woman when I asked you."

"They're _all_ long dead," Garland assures her.

"I like her," Carol says. "She has a very classical look. You have good taste."

"Damn right," Daryl tells her with a smile.

Gary settles down on the floor in front of Daryl and takes out Connect Four.

"Who's yours, Carol?" Shannon asks.

Carol sets aside her sharpening stone and resheaths her knife. "I don't know. I can't think of anyone."

"Nah. No. Nah-ah," Daryl insists. "You can't make me play and then not play."

Carol mulls it over. "You know that show _Lost_ that had just started to air before the world ended?"

"No," Daryl says even as Shannon says, "Yes."

"You had a crush on Jack?"Shannon asks. "I had such a crush on Jack."

"Not Jack," Carol replies. "Sawyer."

"Who the hell's Sawyer?" Daryl asks.

Shannon glances at Daryl and chuckles. "Oh yeah, I could see that. I could see Carol liking Sawyer."

"Hell kind of name is _Sawyer_?" Daryl grumbles.

"Well, the actor's name was John Holloway," Shannon says.

"Hell kind of name is _Josh_?"

"Sawyer _is_ hot," Shannon agrees. "Can I put another one on my freebie list, baby? I want Sawyer, too."

"You only get one."

"Damnit."

"You realize the actors are not the characters they play, darling?" Garland asks her. "And why do women always like the bad boys in fiction anyway?"

"Not the bad boys, baby. The bad boys with a secret heart of gold."

"Why don't they ever like the straight and narrow man who's polite and just does what's right from the start?" Garland asks.

"We like to think our love has changed a man."

"Why can't your love just make him happy?"

Shannon kisses his cheek. "Does my love make you happy, baby? Because you seem a little grumpy."

Carol chuckles.

Daryl puts his crossbow bolt aside on the end table and slides down to the floor to help Gary put together the Connect Four frame he's been struggling with. Daryl knows how to play this one. He used to play it with Hershel at the Hilltop.

"Me first!" Gary insists when the game is ready, and he drops a red checker into a hole. Daryl picks up a yellow checker and contemplates his options, but while he's doing so, Gary drops in another red checker on top of the first. And then he drops in another, and another. "I win!"

"Didn't even get a turn," Daryl grumbles.

"You snooze, you lose," Shannon tells him.

[*]

That night, while Carol gets ready for bed, Daryl sits on the edge of their mattress staring at the bottle of champagne sitting on their dresser, the one they found in the bed and breakfast that she's been saving all this time to toast their first-year anniversary.

"What are you thinking, Pookie?" she asks as she slides the dresser drawer shut.

"Thinkin' Dante likes booze almost as much as he likes smokes, 'n I still gotta lot of damn logs to saw."

"Oh."

"'S like gold. Good booze. Booze from the old world. Worth more'n tobacco even."

She puts a finger on the top of the bottle and looks it over. "Go ahead. Use it to buy more of Dante's labor. You've been working too hard."

"Nah. Know yer savin' it."

She sighs and turns to face him. "If you hadn't wanted me to _offer_ , you wouldn't even have admitted you were thinking it."

He doesn't deny it. "Sorry," he mutters. "Bet Zeke made a real big deal of y'all's first year anniversary."

"He did. Wine and flowers and streamers and a serenade from the Kingdom's violinists and a poem he wrote me himself. But you're not Ezekiel. And I don't want you to be. I want you to be you. And I want you to _stop_ comparing yourself to him."

"Don't."

"You _do_ ," she insists. "Sometimes. I wish you wouldn't. I can't say I regret my time with Ezekiel. He was a good man and he treated me well. But he wasn't the right man for me, and our marriage wouldn't have lasted another year if he had lived. _You're_ the man I always _should_ have married."

"Just…'fraid of dissapointin' ya sometimes."

"You don't. You just keep surprising me with how much you love me." She seizes the champagne from the dresser and extends it to him. "I don't need the damn champagne. I just need _you_."

Daryl stands from the bed, takes the bottle, and sets it back on the dresser so that the can put a hand on both her hips and look her in the eyes. "Gonna give ya that cabin for our anniversary. 'S gonna be a late gift. Couple months late. July. August maybe. But 'm gonna give it to you."

"I _know_ you will." She wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him tenderly.


	58. Chapter 58

Sheriff Earl Carter runs his fingers over his handlebar mustache to smooth it. "I can't deputize you until you're a citizen in three weeks," he tells Carol, who stands in front of one of the empty jailhouse cells. "So you just get the silver patrol badge for now." He hands her a silver star pin. "Wear this whenever you're on patrol."

Carol pins it to the front pocket of her long-sleeve shirt.

"You'll get a gold one when you're a deputy. And when you're a deputy, you'll need to work twenty-six hours a week, so Garland will take you off of fence-cleaning duty. It's a few more hours than other jobs, so you'll get extra ammo rations in payment. Twelve additional rounds, on top of your weekly fifteen. You'll be required to practice on the range with at least seven rounds a week. The others you can hoard or spend. I recommend you never have fewer than ten rounds in your possession."

Carol's never dropping below twenty rounds. Jamestown has been invaded twice, after all, and experienced a mutiny. Fortunately, she still has a box of ammunition from scavenging.

"This morning you'll be patrolling the Indian Village for three hours. It should be fairly quiet. Most people will be at work, and the kids are in school. But some folks will have done their twenty already and just be hanging about. Just keep circling around the perimeter, go up and down between the huts, take notes if anyone stops you with a complaint."

"What kind of complaints?" Carol asks.

"I think my neighbor snatched a strawberry from my private garden. My neighbor is too loud during quiet hours. My neighbor threatened me. That sort of thing. Get the details, write it down, and submit it to me. I'll investigate it. If you see a crime in progress, stop it and detain the suspect and send for me or a deputy. We'll determine whether or not an arrest is necessary. But you'll have the power to do that yourself when you're formally deputized in three weeks."

"Do you make a lot of arrests?"

"Maybe three a week. Usually for drunk and disorderly, which typically means a night in the drunk tank to sleep it off, unless it's a repeat offense, and then the court might assess fines. Occasionally, you'll have to break up a fist fight between a couple of men. Again, that usually results in fines. And you might happen upon a domestic."

Carol tenses instinctively. "And how are those treated?" Ed's abuse of her was simply ignored in the quarry, until Shane snapped. In Alexandria, Pete got away with abusing Jesse until everything came to a bloody head.

"It depends on the circumstances, of course. If blame can be assigned, there's an arrest, a trial, and then a penalty assigned by the court. Five months ago we convicted a man of beating his wife. He got hard labor for a month, a living reassingment, and a restraining order. And he had to pay his ex a quarter of his rations for a year."

"What do you mean," Carol asks, " _if_ blame can be assigned?"

"Well, that woman was clearly the victim and was willing to leave him. But that's not always how it goes. Bob and Mary, for instance, are always fighting. They _both_ can get physical with each other. She won't leave, and neither will he. Neither ever wants to press charges against the other, and it's often impossible to determine who started it. So we treat it as a public disturbance more than anything else. She's bigger than he is, but he's a bit stronger. It's a pretty equal smackdown. Garland keeps them on different farming shifts so they at least don't ever work together and don't have the same days off."

"Do they have children?" Carol asks with concern.

"No. Thank God," Earl replies. "And he had a vasectomy in the old world, so they won't be having them. Do you have a working watch?"

"No," Carol answers. "Not anymore."

"I'll get you one. It's a wind up. Be sure to record the time if you stop a disturbance or take down a complaint." He hands her a small notebook and a led pencil.

[*]

Because Daryl's done with his twenty hours for the week, he takes yet another day to work on the cabin. With the help of Dante, he saws and seals more logs.

"What do you know about Sarah?" Dante asks when they take a water break. "She's one of your Kingdom people."

"Was a knight," Daryl mutters after a swig from his canteen. "Good archer. Longbow. Rides well. Good soldier. Garland's got 'er on dock patrol. Why?"

"I'm thinking of asking her out to The Tavern for a drink. Or maybe for dinner at my hut, if I can get my two roommates to take a hike one night. I mean I _do_ have champagne now."

"Not yet ya don't. Ain't getting' it 'till ya put in all of the hours ya promised me."

"I thought you'd be happy I took an interest in someone other than your wife."

Daryl narrows his eyes. "Thought ya said ya weren't comin' on to m'wife. That ya were just bein' _polite_."

Dante shrugs. "To be honest, I was testing the waters. They weren't receptive."

Daryl glowers at him.

Dante chuckles. "I know you want to deck me, but you can't, because one, I'm bigger than you, and you wouldn't win that fight, and, two, you want me to help you build this cabin."

"Trust me," Daryl growls. "'S just the second one."

"You think you're bigger than me?"

"Clearly I ain't. Just know I _would_ win that fight."

"Maybe. By cunning and stealth. The way you took out those mutineers." Dante smiles. "I'll try to stay on your good side."

"Try harder." Daryl tightens the top on his canteen, more tightly than he needs to. "'S get back to work."

"You ever seen Sarah with a black dude?" Dante asks as they walk over to the stand that holds the log they're currently sizing.

"No."

"Ever seen her with anyone?" Dante asks.

"Was married. He died fightin' the Saviors."

"Why would you fight saviors?"

Daryl picks up one end of the two-man buck saw and Dante takes the other end. "'S a gang. 'S what they called themselves. Long story."

"How long ago did her husband die?"

"Dunno…six years ago. Seven?" Time is getting fuzzy for him. "Get to work."

Together, they begin pushing and pulling the saw through the wood.

[*]

Patrol is more interesting than standing guard in the light house, but it's still fairly uneventful. The Indian Village is sparsely inhabited at the moment. Outside the old whorehut, she finds one of her Kingdom people, Juan, working in the private garden the group has boxed in at some point over the past week.

"What are you planting?" she asks him.

"Tobacco plants. I bought the seeds from the storehouse with my ammo rations. I thought I could double or triple my return. Tobacco seems to be the best money here."

"That's a good idea." Garland and Shannon's private garden just has vegetables. Although if enough people grow their own tobacco, Carol supposes it will become less valuable in trade, and she'd rather have a private food source anyway. You can't eat tobacco if people stop taking it. "How is your sister and brother-in-law?"

"They're doing well," Juan replies. "The other two couples, too. It's a little crowded in there, but at least we have the privacy dividers. Raul and I are thinking of building an extension onto the hut, just to spread things out a bit. The neighbor says I have to run it by the council. Apparently there are _zoning laws_ here." He laughs.

"No one told us we had to run our cabin by the council," Carol says.

"I think it only applies when you're expanding within a certain distance of a neighboring hut or cabin. Our immediate neighbors are a cantankerous old couple, so they're going to protest us building."

"I'm sorry about that. They ought to at least prefer you to the brothel that used to be here."

Juan chuckles. "I think the old man preferred the scenery outside the brothel. Most of our neighbors are decent, though. We're settling. We're appreciative. Thank you for leading us here."

Carol smiles and patrols on. She passes a hut from which a man emerges, buckling his belt. He ducks his head and scurries on. A woman comes out the second time Carol passes by the same hut, and greets a _different_ man in a fisherman's cap, who is walking toward the hut from the direction of the old fort. "Hi, honey!" the woman calls. "I thought you were at work?"

"I got the schedule mixed up. I'm on tomorrow." He follows her into the hut.

Carol continues on without comment, but she feels a bit sorry for the fisherman.

On her third time around the perimeter, she's staying clear of the bee hives when she gets stopped by the bee keeper, who leaves the insects behind to catch up with her. He raises the netting around his face. "Are you Carol Stuart?" he asks.

"Carol Dixon," she clarifies.

"I'm Timmothy. It's such an honor to meet you." He pulls off his thick glove and extends his hand, and she shakes it. "You look a little different in the sketch."

"Hmm…well. Artistic license, I suppose." Carol patrols on.

She doesn't have to break up any disturbances, but she does have to take down one noise complaint. Someone's apparently been practicing his fiddle at midnight, and quiet hours begin at 10:30 p.m.

[*]

A chunk of wood falls to the ground. "Next one," Daryl says.

But Dante lets go of his end of the saw. "Look, I'm not quite done with my twenty for the week. I've got to go do some repairs on the gristmill. But I'll come back tomorrow and finish off the hours I promised you."

Daryl continues sawing on his own with a one-man crosscut saw, which is a lot harder to do. He's stopping to wipe the sweat from his brow with the back of his arm when his hunting partner Mitch stops by and says, "I got that deer finally. You were right. It went through the creek."

"Good," Daryl murmurs. "Didn't take the day off?" If Daryl's done with his twenty, then so is Mitch.

"I sponsor an orphan. I put in an extra fifteen hours a week for her rations. And then I put in an extra ten on top of that to earn extra ammo." He looks at the saw that Daryl's rested in the log. "I guess there's no point in asking, since you _always_ say you have to work on the cabin, but…you want that lunch at The Tavern? On me?"

Mitch sounds wounded, and it hits Daryl suddenly that maybe he's been rude to keep saying no. He's never been good at the social niceties. And a free lunch wouldn't be bad at all. Then maybe Dante will take the deer jerky and peanuts rations he was _going_ to eat for lunch in exchange for just a little more work. "Hell, yeah, sure. Just need to finish this one cut 'n put away m'tools."

[*]

Carol's patrol path swings her by The Tavern around 11:50 AM, about ten minutes before she gets off duty, and she finds a farmer lingering outside the closed saloon shutters, waiting for the place to open for lunch. His straw hat is pushed down over his eyes, and his hands are shoved deep in the pockets of his overalls.

From the other direction, a blond man in a blue-and-gray navy working camo uniform strides purposefully toward The Tavern. He's holding a rolled-up scroll in his hand. Carol's been wanting to talk to a sailor about a water route to Oceanside, so she stops him and introduces herself as Carol Dixon.

"Captain David Cummings," he replies, with smiling hazel eyes, and extends his hand. "It's an honor to meet you. I was only an ensign before that mutiny. I didn't meet you the first time you were here."

"But you're a captain now?"

"Yes. I was fond of the old captain, despite his excesses, but I always loathed the lieutenant and the lieutenant commander. Commander Harrison had me fooled, though. I thought he was an upstanding man."

"He had everyone fooled," Carol assures him. She's not just found a sailor, she's found _the_ captain himself, who, according to Garland, is also on the town council. Maybe today is her lucky day. She nods to the rolled-up scroll in his hand. "Is that a navigation map by any chance?"

"It is." He taps it against the open palm of one hand. "I was going to have a working lunch at The Tavern and use it to look for a better fishing route. Why?"

[*]

The saloon shutters have been latched back. A buxom, blonde, curly-haired waitress in a tight, white, low-cut t-shirt greets Mitch and Daryl when they walk in through the wide-open doorway. The words _The Tavern_ are painted in red on her shirt where it pulls tightly across her breasts, not that Daryl's looking. The day's specials are written in a girly script of pink and white chalk on a free-standing black board near the entrance:

 _Soup of the Day – Chicken & Rice _

_Jamestown Brew, by the pint_

 _Moonshine, by the shot_

 _Ask for today's prices_

 _Live Music 7 PM – 10 PM_

 _The Mason Brothers Band_

There's a slightly raised stage in the corner, with a piano and two stands that hold a fiddle and a guitar.

"Right this way, boys," the waitress says. "I'm Candy," she tells Daryl. "I don't think I've seen you in here before. Are you with that new group that came to Jamestown?"

"Mhm."

She leads them to one of several small card tables with folding metal chairs. Daryl sits down opposite Mitch. A large black cauldron of soup hangs above the flames of the nearby fireplace, sending its tempting scent drifting on curls of steam throughout the room. A rough wood bar in the shape of a U, with high wood stools, lines the opposite side of the tavern. The loft above the bar contains three rooms, divided by panels of plywood, with a curtain drawn across the front of each. That must be where Madam Linda and both waitresses live.

"Trisha's not working today?" Mitch asks.

"We both work in the evenings, but we alternate lunch duty," Candy tells him. "It's just not busy enough at lunch."

Madam Linda, plump and gray-haired, sits alone at the far end of the bar, making notes in a ledger. There are only three other customers - one man on the opposite end of the bar from Madam Linda, with a farmer's straw hat on the empty stool beside him, and a couple sitting at the center of the bar.

Daryl blinks. He knows half of that couple. He knows the woman. That woman is his _wife_.

The man sitting next to her wears a blue-and-gray camo navy working uniform, but he's taken off the cap to reveal a head of thick blond hair. He's sitting _awfully_ close and leaning in to talk to Carol. He's got a pint of beer in front of himself, and Carol's got a pint of beer to the right side of her, and they've just pushed two empty bowls to the front of the bar.

Did that asshole buy his wife lunch and a drink? Why are the men in this town always trying to buy _his wife_ drinks?

"'Scuse me a minute," Daryl tells Mitch. His chair scrapes back on the rough wood planks of the tavern floor as he stands.


	59. Chapter 59

Daryl walks over beside the Navy man and stares at him until he stops talking to Carol mid-sentence. The man turns and looks up at Daryl.

"This is my husband," Carol says. "Daryl, this is Captain David Cummings."

The captain holds his hand out. Daryl looks down at it with a scowl. Eventually the captain retracts his hand, unshaken. "Pleased to meet you," Captain Cummings says calmly. "I've heard all about your exploits in the mutiny of 7 NE. I suppose I owe my promotion to your culling of the traitorous herd."

Daryl grunts. Who the hell talks like that? _The culling of the traitorous herd._ Hell does this guy think he is? Winston Churchill? Daryl nods to Carol's pint of beer. "Havin' a drink?"

"David's treating me."

 _David._ "Is he now?" Daryl asks.

She nods to the table where Mitch sits. "Looks like Mitch's treating you, too. You shouldn't leave him waiting. That would be rude."

There's a warning tone in her voice, and Daryl doesn't miss it. "Mhmhm." He looks over the captain one last time before returning to sit across from Mitch.

"What can I get y'all?" Candy says once Daryl's seated again.

"What's the soup cost today?" Mitch asks.

"A sixth of an ounce of tobacco, five rounds of ammo, a cup of coffee beans, or your best offer."

"I'll pay in ammo," Mitch says. "The beer and shine are still three rounds?"

"Yep," Candy replies.

"Then a bowl of soup for each of us, and – do you want moonshine or beer?" Mitch asks him.

"Beer," Daryl mutters.

"Beer for me, too." Mitch fishes into the inside of the front pocket of his green camo vest and sets down on the table a white plastic tray with 17 rounds of Remington .223. "Keep the change."

"All one round of it? Thanks, honey. Maybe if I wait on you two more times I can actually afford a drink." Candy plucks up the ammo and sashays away.

"Well now I feel like an ass," Mitch mutters. "It's not like they don't get a salary, too. They get basic rations like everyone else."

The waitress is back quickly with their pints of beer and clunks them down on the table without even looking at Mitch before walking off again. "It's not like ammo is cheap!" Mitch calls after her.

"I'll buy you a drink, sweetheart!" says the man at the end of the bar. He plucks his farmer's hat off the stool. Candy sashays over to him, smiling, and sits down beside him.

Madam Linda looks up from her ledger and says, "You have customers, Candy."

"I served them," she replies.

"Not the soup."

Candy sighs and slides off the stool before going behind the bar to draw out two wooden bowls.

Daryl sips his Jamestown brew and glances over at the center of the bar. Carol and _David_ are leaned almost head to head now. The captain's unrolled some kind of paper across the bar and is showing her something on it. Captain Cummings says something to her, and she laughs. Daryl instinctively grits his teeth.

Candy walks over and plops their bowls of soup down hard enough on their table that a little sloshes over the sides.

"Man at the bar," Daryl asks Mitch when the waitress leaves, "sittin' next to Carol. He married?"

"Captain Cummings? No. But I hear he's started seeing some woman from your Kingdom. I guess he has his pick of the new women. I mean, he's a captain. He's also on the town council, _and_ he's really good-looking. You like the soup?"

"'S good," Daryl grunts, even though he hasn't actually tasted it yet. He turns his attention from Captain Cummings back to his soup, grumbling, "Don't see 's good-looking about 'em."

"Well, I mean, if you like the blond Adonis type. And that Grecian nose. Not to mention those beautiful hazel eyes. He has good poise, too. He's a little _too_ polished in my opinion." Mitch smiles strangely at Daryl. "I like them a bit rougher."

Daryl slurps soup off his spoon. It really _is_ good, and he can't remember the last time he ate chicken. "Thought y'all just kept chickens for the eggs."

"We don't eat them until they stop laying so frequently. So consider this a real treat."

Mitch and Daryl finish eating their soup in silence. Two introverts sitting across the table from each other doesn't make for much conversation. It was fine in the woods, but it's a bit awkward in the tavern.

"Got a girl?" Daryl asks, just because he can't think of anything else to ask.

" _Me_?" Mitch lets out a laugh. "Oh, no. Certainly not _me_."

"Mhm."

"So you want to try tracking a black bear next week?" Mitch ventures after another minute of silence. "They might be out of their dens by then."

"Sure." Daryl fishes his last bite of chicken and rice in silence.

When Candy comes to try to clear his soup bowl away, Daryl mutters, "Hold on," tugs it back, picks it up, and noisily slurps down the last of the broth. She looks at him with a raised eyebrow that makes him think maybe other men don't do that with the broth. Captain Cummings glances back at him, too. Daryl puts the bowl down and pushes it over to the edge of the table. Candy stacks his and Mitch's empty bowls together and clears them.

Things fall silent again for a while as they sip their pints of beer.

"I took your advice," Mitch says at last. "Fixed a bayonet to my rifle."

"Good."

"I used it to kill a cannibal today, so I saved myself a bullet."

"Mhm."

The two men each take one small, silent sip of beer. Daryl glances at David and Carol at the bar again. She's running her fingertip along the paper, and he's turned his body so he's half facing her, with his knee almost at her hip.

"Oh, and the cannibal had a spare magazine in one of his pockets," Mitch adds to break the silence. "I don't know what happened to his gun, but the magazine had ten rounds of .22."

"Good find," Daryl grunts.

"Yeah. Especially since I promised my orphan I'd take her to the movies this afternoon. They're showing Monster's Inc. Three rounds of ammo per ticket. But that includes a small popcorn."

"Mhmm." Daryl glances at the bar yet again. The captain has turned forward and is smiling as he lifts his pint.

"The cannibal looked like it had turned sometime in the last six months," Mitch says. "I wonder if it wasn't one of those attackers."

"Mhm. Maybe."

"He probably got shot in the battle against us, retreated, and died in the woods." When Daryl doesn't say anything else for a minute, Mitch says, "I…uh….better get going. I have to clean my guns before I take my orphan to the movies." Mitch drains the last sip of his beer and pushes back his chair.

"Thanks for the lunch, man," Daryl tells him.

"Sure. Maybe we can get a drink again some time?"

"Mhm." Daryl senses he's supposed to say he's buying next time, but he doesn't want to waste ammo or tobacco. He's suddenly reminded of how Merle used to encourage him to blow through all his money when he was trying his damn hardest to save enough for a deposit on a small apartment, so they wouldn't have to keep sleeping in the truck or in drugged-out girls' trailers. Merle would buy beer, and then Daryl was supposed to buy beer, and then Merle would buy, and then Daryl would buy…but Daryl didn't _want_ to buy. He wanted to _save_. "Maybe."

When Mitch is gone, Candy returns to clear his empty, abandoned pint glass and takes Daryl's, too. "Want anything else?" she asks.

"'Nother pint," he says, because even though it's a waste of ammo, he's _not_ leaving this tavern as long as Captain Cummings is talking to his wife, and it's going to look strange if he's sitting here with nothing to eat or drink.

"You have to pay first."

"Three rounds, right?" Daryl slides his handgun out of his holster and drops the magazine to start counting out ammunition.

As he's prying out a fourth round for a tip, Candy says, "Wait a minute. Are you _him_?"

"Him who?"

"Daryl Dixon? Oh my God! Are you Daryl Dixon?"

"Uh…"

Now Captain Cummings and Carol are both glancing back at him.

"Oh my God, wow!" Candy looks him up and down. "What happened to your hair? Didn't it used to be almost shoulder length?"

"Growin' it back."

"I expected a sexy _scar_ , you know? I mean, you're still hot, just not what I expected."

"Give him a pint on the house, Candy," Madam Linda says. "Carol, too. It's an honor to have the heroes of the Mutiny of 7 NE in our midst. I'll pay for them out of my cut."

Since he's being treated, Daryl reloads two rounds into his magazine, but he leaves two on the table to make up for Mitch's apparently unsatisfactory tip. Candy scoops the bullets up. "Thanks, handsome." She gives him a little wink.

Daryl clicks the magazine back into his handgun, double checks the safety, and holsters it. Candy refills Carol's pint glass and then brings Daryl his. After that, the waitress plops herself down on the stool next to the farmer who offered to buy her a drink.

Daryl takes a small, slow sip. He's not sure how long he's going to have to nurse this pint.

The answer is, not very long. Three minutes later, Captain Cummings pushes his empty pint glass across the bar and slides off his bar stool. He says something to Carol, rolls up his map, and salutes her with it as he walks away from the bar. He pauses near Daryl's table and says, "It was a pleasure to meet you" before disappearing out the open tavern door.

Daryl seizes his pint glass and comes to sit next to Carol. "Hell was that all 'bout?"

"The hell was _what_ all about?" she asks.

"That cap'n buyin' ya lunch?"

Carol tilts her head at him. "I'm allowed to talk to other men, Daryl. I'm allowed to have lunch with one."

"Never said ya ain't _allowed_! Just don't like 'em _buyin'_ it for ya."

"But it was okay for Madam Linda to buy you a pint?"

"'S diff'rn."

"Why?" Carol asks

"'Cause she ain't tryin' to get in my pants!"

"How do you know I'm not?" Madam Linda asks from the other end of the bar, and Daryl flushes while Carol laughs.

Daryl lowers his voice. "A man don't buy a woman a drink less'n he _wants_ somethin' from her."

"The way Mitch wanted something from you?"

"What? 'S diff'rn. He ain't trying to get in my pants."

Carol chuckles. "He's not _seriously_ trying, because he knows you're straight and married, but he sure would _like_ to."

"Hell ya talkin' 'bout?"

"You _do_ know Mitch is gay, right? And that he's probably attracted to you?"

Daryl looks back at the table where he sat with Mitch. He blinks for a minute and then says, "Oh." Now all that detail about how good-looking Captain Cummings is and _liking them rougher_ makes a bit more sense. "Still diff'rn. That cap'n, he wants somethin' from ya."

"Well, you're wrong. _I_ wanted something from _him_."

Daryl blinks.

"I wanted to discuss something with him," she explains. "He was headed to lunch anyway, and he offered to treat me. So I let him, to give us a chance to talk."

"Hell ya wanna discuss with 'em?" asks Daryl, confused.

"Oceanside is situated on the Chesapeake Bay. Well, I was looking at the map in the museum the other day, and I realized the James River flows all the way to the Chesapeake Bay. The captain is a navigator, and on the council, so I wanted to discuss with him the possibility of a crew sailing there for the trade fair Dianne promised they'd have in November. I also thought, while I'm there, I'd talk to Cyndie and Michonne and Aaron about making Oceanside the hub of the Alexandria-Hilltop-Oceanside alliance, now that the Kingdom is gone. And then maybe a trade team from Jamestown could sail there not only for the annual trade fair in the fall every year, but maybe a second and third time in spring and summer. Three trading trips a year. The ship could store plenty of goods, _and_ take an entire team."

"'S a good idea!"

"David thought so, too. He says these ships sail at four to five knots."

"Hell's a knot?" Daryl asks.

"About five miles per hour. But since, unlike a horse, a ship moves 24 hours a day, he thinks the _Susan Constant_ can sail all the way there in less than three days. This could be a good thing. This could unite our two worlds. I could see Henry three times a year!. You could see Hershel and Judith, at least at the annual fair. Jamestown men could end up marrying Oceanside women. People could marry and move between the two communities. We could all be one people again!"

"'N the captain said he'll do it?"

She shakes her head. "It's not up to him. It's up to the Town Council. But they have open town hall meetings three times a week. Anyone can address the council, even non-citizens. So I'm going to the one tomorrow afternoon to propose it. David says I'll have his vote. I'm guessing I'll have Garland and Shannon's, too, so…that's three out of six already. It _could_ happen."

"'S a damn good idea!"

She smiles, pulls her pint glass to herself, sips, and then asks, "Still jealous?"

"Wasn't _jealous_."

"You were acting a little possessive there."

"Ain't like I punched 'em in the face." Eight years ago, he probably would have.

"I'd like to think you trust me," she says.

"'Course I trust ya. Wasn't _you_ I was worried 'bout."

"I hope you trust me to be able to deflect unwanted male attention entirely on my own," she clarifies. "I mean, I _am_ one of the heroes of the mutiny of 7 NE."

"Pfft."

She ducks her head to catch his eye. "Okay?"

"A'ight," he mutters.

"I suppose it's a _little_ bit flattering," she admits, "as long as you're not a total caveman about it." She smiles at him over her pint glass. "It's nice to know you think I've still got it."

"'Course ya still got it." He rakes his eyes over her. " _All_ of it."

She laughs. Daryl smiles and sips his beer.

Carol glances at the stage. "We should come back here tonight for the music."

"Don't wanna spend any more ammo."

"Come on," she says. "We'll come after we eat dinner. We won't buy the soup. We'll just have one beer each, plus tip…that's only eight rounds of ammo. I get twenty-seven a week now, and I only _have_ to shoot seven practice rounds. I'll treat. Take my man on a date."

Those eight rounds might buy him another hour of work from Dante, but he doesn't say so. "Dunno. Gonna be country music?" he mutters.

"They do Irish folk music," Madam Linda says.

"Ya got supersonic hearin' down there?" Daryl calls.

"It's one of my many gifts."

"Can you tolerate Irish folk, Pookie?" Carol asks. "For me?"

Daryl sighs. "A'ight. Take m'gril on a date."

"So _you're_ paying then?" Carol asks.

"'S all one pot anyhow, ain't it?"

"No. I have my own separate checking account."

Daryl shoots her a puzzled look.

"Ed controlled all the finances," Carol explains. "And he intentionally kept me in the dark about them. I never knew how much money we had, or what he was spending it on. I had to ask for money to buy groceries or clothes, or whatever. I know you're not Ed, and plenty of couples can have everything in joint and work as a team. But my money's never been my money, and so I just like the idea of it. My ammo is my ammo. And my tobacco is my tobacco, too. But since you're using it to build _our_ cabin, I'll gladly keep giving it to you. So do you want _me_ to treat tonight? With _my_ ammo?"

Daryl let's out a sigh that's half a growl. She already gave up the damn champagne. And he _does_ still have sixteen of the twenty rounds he was rationed this week. And he'll get another twenty next week. She gets more as a patrolman – twenty-seven a week - but he's not required to expend any at the practice range like her. "Nah. M' treat."

She smiles, kisses him on the cheek, and whispers, "Thank you."


	60. Chapter 60

Shannon can't drink and doesn't want to be in the smoke-filled tavern in her pregnant state, so she and Garland stay home for a quiet evening while Carol and Daryl go to The Tavern. The place is packed when they walk through the saloon doors, and the rafters shake with music and laughter and talk. The scent of chicken rice stew mingles with sweet tobacco, smoke, fruity beer, and pungent moonshine.

Carol and Daryl take up the only two empty stools on the far end of the U of the bar, Daryl with his shoulder crammed against the rough wood wall, but they still have a good view of the stage. Fiddle joins piano, guitar, and banjo in toe-tapping Irish jigs alternating with softer folk ballads.

"How come they call 'em the _Mason Brothers_ if they got a girl?" Daryl asks Madam Linda when she pours them their pints. The woman is tending bar while the waitresses, Candy and Trisha, serve the tables.

"She's the baby sister," Madam Linda replies over the music. "I guess they thought it sounded better than the Mason Siblings Band. And one of them is a brother-in-law." She leaves them their pints and then disappears with two more to the other end of the bar.

"I like the music," Carol says.

"Ain't awful," Daryl concedes.

A few men offer to buy Carol drinks, but after she shoots the third one down, the rest stop asking. Even more men ask to shake Daryl's hand when word spreads that the hero of the mutiny of 7 NE is in their midst. Daryl shakes the first few with barely veiled pride, and the last few with barely veiled annoyance. When the train of admirers peters out, he sighs in relief and takes a big sip of Jamestown brew.

"What do you think the alcohol content of this is?" Carol asks him.

From the middle of the bar, where she's serving a customer, Madam Linda calls, "It's 12%."

"Jesus," Daryl mutters to Carol. "Don't whisper any secrets within a mile of 'er."

Carol chuckles.

There are three men for every woman in the tavern, and there's never a woman without a dancing partner. Several tables have been cleared from in front of the stage to make a dance floor.

Carol bumps Daryl's shoulder playfully and pleads, "Dance with me." He plants both feet on the bottom rung of his stool and shakes his head. " _Please_ , Pookie?

"Nah. Really _can't_ dance." He does splurge with his ammo, though, and buys her a second pint, but he doesn't buy himself one, and Carol can see him tapping his fingers on his leg, counting how many rounds he still has left from his weekly rations.

"If you don't dance with me, you know," she warns him, "I'm going to have to dance with someone else."

"Fine," he mutters. "Dance with 'em all."

"You don't care? It won't make you jealous?"

"Ain't jealous. All these men can dance with ya all they want." He stabs his chest with his thumb. "'M the one's gonna take ya to bed tonight."

She smiles, leans in, and kisses his cheek. "Then I'm dancing with Dante."

"Wait. What. _He's_ here?"

She nods to a table where Dante sits with three other men.

"A'ight, anyone _but_ him."

"What about Captain Cummings?" Carol teases, nodding to where he stands talking to Sarah. The captain sets his pint glass down on a table, takes Sarah by the hand, and tugs her to the floor.

"Looks like he's got a dance partner already," Daryl says. "Dante ain't gonna be happy 'bout it, though. He was gonna ask her out."

Andrew, who has recently entered the tavern, spies them and comes over to say hello and re-introduce himself. "I remember you," Carol assures him. "You're the deputy who helped clean Harold off the cabin floor."

"That was _quite_ a night," Andrew says. "Sheriff Earl says you're joining the force?"

"I should be deputized in three weeks," Carol confirms.

"Well, we're lucky to have you." Andrew looks from Daryl back to her. "Listen, if you're not going to be dancing with your husband, would you mind if I took you for a spin on the dance floor?" He holds his hands up at his shoulders, palms out, and assures Daryl, "I promise I won't get handsy."

Carol turns to Daryl with a smirk and a raised eyebrow, fully expecting him to recant his blanket permission when faced with the sketch artist who overestimated her chest size, but he just shrugs.

"Go on. Have yer fun." He leans in and whispers in her ear. "He ain't never gonna know how perfect they _really_ are."

Carol chuckles as she slides off the stool and follows Andrew to the floor. After she dances with him, she's asked to dance by Thomas, the field medic, and then with a fisherman named Marcus, a forty-something, raven-haired man who isn't unattractive but still smells faintly of fish. She does learn Marcus is on the council, however, and so tries to make a good impression, since she'll be presenting her case for establishing a trade route to Oceanside at the town hall tomorrow. She slips into the conversation, which happens between swings, that Oceanside's population is eighty percent female. She figures that knowledge is the surest way of securing a crew big enough to sail a ship.

"Is anyone else here on the council?" Carol asks as they swing in again. She's thinking if there's another single man, she'll be sure to let him dance with her. But when they swing back, Marcus tells her. "Carolyn's here. Captain Cummings. And Dr. Ahmad."

Carol doesn't think she'll invite the female veterinarian to dance. Captain Cummings seems to be in high demand, and Dr. Ahmad appears to have brought his wife.

When the song finishes up, Marcus thanks her. Dante asks her to dance next, but Carol tells him she's tired out from her last three and goes to rejoin Daryl at the bar, only to find some other woman has taken _her_ stool and is talking to _her_ husband. The dark-eyed, brown-skinned beauty has black hair down to her hips.

"Are you going to introduce me?" she asks Daryl pointedly, but it's the woman who introduces herself, as Inola.

"Sorry for taking your seat," Inola says, and hops down from the stool, takes her pint glass from the bar, and raises it to Daryl. "Thanks for the drink."

Inola disappears quickly, leaving Carol with a dumfounded look on her face as she sits down next to Daryl. "Are you kidding me?" she asks. "After that scene this afternoon, you went and bought a woman a pint of - "

"- Didn't buy it!" Daryl insists. "Mean, I _did_ , but it was payment."

"Payment for _what_?" Carol's glad for a sudden rise in the music, because she didn't mean to shout it.

"That pint got me a promise of one hour's work. Be awhile for I need 'er though."

"Need her for _what_?"

"Told ya I was gonna try to get the mason to help me with the chimney and foundation when m' done with the logs."

" _She's_ the mason?"

"Pffft. Expected the mason to be a man, didn't ya?"

"Well, I didn't expect the mason to be quite so…" Carol glances back at Inola, who is now handing that pint Daryl bought her over to a man who has the same skin tone and hair color as her. Two other men also sit at the table, and they lean in attentively when the woman starts talking. " _Inola_ , huh?"

"'S a Cherokee name. Means black fox."

"Of course it does." Carol turns back from looking at Inola's table. "Is one of those men her husband?"

"'S it matter?"

"Just curious."

"Dunno. Said she wanted the pint for 'er brother. Dunno who the other two are."

The music switches from jigs to a soft and haunting love ballad. The dance floor thins down. Captain Cummings, who's danced with Sarah twice now, steps aside when Dante asks to take her to the floor, but the captain is immediately snatched up by the veterinarian Carolyn. Dr. Ahmad dances with his wife. Andrew manages to talk one of the waitresses onto the floor, at least until Madam Linda tells her, sixty seconds later, to get back to work.

Carol notices Daryl watching the singer closely. "She's pretty, huh?" Carol teases. The woman _is_ pretty, though quite young, probably not more than twenty-five. Daryl's been looking at her for longer than he _usually_ looks at people.

"Just reminds me of someone."

Carol follows his gaze and listens to the hauntingly beautiful Irish ballad. "Beth," she says quietly.

"Yeah," he murmurs.

The prison seems like another world now, a time when they all faintly fantasized of the settled life they've only _now_ begun to realize. "I think you need a second drink, too," Carol tells him. " _My_ treat."

"A'ight."

Carol raises a finger and Madam Linda comes and grabs Daryl's pint glass for a refill. "Let me try the shine," Daryl tells her, and she comes back with a whiskey glass with one ounce of clear liquid instead.

" _Try_ it?" Carol asks. "You had it last time you were here."

"Garland says it's better now." He takes a small sip and rolls it on his tongue.

"Is it?" she asks.

"Bit, yeah, but just as damn strong. Try it." He tips his glass to her.

With an elbow on the bar and her head on her hand, Carol bats her eyelashes at him, "Are you trying to get me drunk, Mr. Dixon? So you can get in my pants?"

He smirks. "Think I can get 'em off ya sober."

She swipes the whiskey glass from his hand, takes a little sip, and hisses. "God that's even stronger than I remember it being."

Daryl laughs.

They take turns taking tiny sips of the shine from the glass, and Carol hisses a little less each time. Since she's already had two pints of strong beer, she can feel it going to her head after the second sip, and the music is starting to sound even _better_.

Dr. Ahmad comes over and offers to buy them _both_ a pint of beer. Daryl says yes, probably because he's being included in the offer and the man is with his wife. So Dr. Ahmad buys pints for all four of them, using tobacco instead of ammo, and the bar grows suddenly less loud while the band takes a break, until the hum of conversation fills the room.

Dr. Ahmad introduces his wife, Tamara, a petite woman of Palestinian origin, with thick eyelashes that make Carol jealous. "How long have you been married?" Carol asks them.

"Seventeen years next week," Tamara tells her.

"Oh!" Carol exclaims in surprise. "A marriage from _before_ the collapse?"

"Our marriage has been through worse," Tamara quips, and Dr. Ahmad rolls his eyes. "So I think my husband developed quite a crush on you when you were in that infirmary."

Carol's not sure how to respond to that. Dr. Ahmad _was_ flirting with her, and Carol _was_ using that to her advantage. But Tamara only appears to be teasing, as though maybe she doesn't mind her husband flirting with other women, as long as he doesn't take it any further than that.

"Shush, Tammy," Dr. Ahmad hisses, and Tamara chuckles. The doctor changes the subject. "Tamara used to be a nuclear physicist in the old world, but here she mostly works as an engineer."

"I help maintain the power and water to the museum. I had to teach myself a few things."

"But ya ain't on the council?" Daryl asks.

"No, but who knows." Tamara puts a hand on Dr. Ahmad's shoulder. "I might run against my own husband in July."

"Well then I'm going down," Dr. Ahmad quips.

"We could _both_ win."

"I don't think the people take too kindly to relatives being on the council."

"Shannon and Garland are both on the council," Carol says.

"Yes, and there's been some grumbling about that," Dr. Ahmad notes. "It's probably why Shannon isn't running again in July. She'd lose."

"That's _not_ why," Tamara insists. "She just wants more time for the baby. And she's had a lot of great ideas, hasn't she?"

Between Dr. Ahmad and Carol, the conversation shifts to medical topics. Carol's training under Hershel comes up. "You really practiced on _cannibals_?" Dr. Ahmad asks.

"I never actually had to perform that C-section. I've still never done one."

"Well, let's hope you never have to," Tamara says. "No offense, I don't mean – "

"- I know what you mean," Carol assures her. "Jamestown is lucky to have the professional medical staff it does. Your husband saved my life."

When the band strikes up again, Dr. Ahmad and his wife excuse themselves to go dance.

Daryl and Carol sit side by side and listen to the music as they finish up the pints Dr. Ahmad bought them. Another man asks Carol to dance, but she replies, "I'm on my third pint." Not to mention the moonshine she shared with Daryl. "I don't think I have much rhythm at the moment."

But as soon as those pints are drained, they get instantly refilled. "Courtesy of Lieutenant James Witherspoon," Madam Linda tells them.

"Who?" Daryl grunts.

Madam Linda half turns from the bar to point at an auburn-haired man on the other side who can't be more than twenty-five. He raises his own pint to them. "Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Dixon!" the lieutenant calls across the bar. "For killing those bastards and ensuring my promotion."

Daryl raises his pint in salute and then sips.

"I guess it's okay for men to buy me drinks if they're also buying you drinks?" Carol asks as she draws her pint closer.

"Kid's buyin' _Mr. and Mrs. Dixon_ drinks," Daryl replies with a sloppy grin.

They sip and talk and laugh, and the taverngoers grow more boisterous. The voices rise almost louder than the music, and some of the married couples leave. Daryl, apparently no longer caring about hoarding his rations now that he's three pints and half a shot in, orders himself another shot of moonshine, but Carol is still nursing the beer the lieutenant bought her. A fist fight breaks out between two men at the other end of the bar and has to be broken up by the deputy Andrew, who then leaves with the two men, to the mixed cheers and boos of the rest of the tavern goers.

"Glad I'm not on patrol," Carol says.

Daryl shoots the last of his moonshine, takes Carol's hand, and tugs her down from the stool. "C'mon. 'S get out of here 'fore it gets crazy."

Carol's eyes are twinkling when they get out into the fresh air of the Indian Village. With her fingers laced through his as they walk, she rests her head on his shoulder and hums.

"Think yer drunk," he says.

"You are, too."

"Nah. 'M sober as the grave." He stumbles forward, steadies himself, and walks on as she giggles. "Just tripped on a tree root," he insists.

They weave their way through the Indian Village as the sounds of the tavern die behind them. They pass a patrolman in the settlement and make their way back to the cabin. Carol trips on the new wood floor which is a bit uneven at the dirt entry way when she walks in, stumbles forward two steps before steadying herself, and laughs. She spies Gary on the deerskin rug, in the light of the gated-off, dwindling fire, lying stomach down with his arm slung around Dog. A blanket has been draped over him, and his back rises and falls with his breathing.

"Shhh!" she half yells.

"You shhh!" Daryl tells her.

She points to the sleeping boy and puts a finger to her lips.

"Hell's he doing out here?" Daryl asks.

Carol giggles and points to Shannon and Garland's closed bedroom door. As if on cue, Shannon's long, satisfied, "Ohhhhhhhhh!" drifts out.

"Think he's finally gettin' some?" Daryl whispers with a grin. At least he probably _thinks_ he's whispering.

"Either that or she's filming a shampoo commercial," Carol says, and they both snort and tip toe toward the bedroom, where Daryl kisses her sloppily as he kicks the door shut behind himself.

The rooms goes black, because the shutters are closed and they haven't lit an oil lamp. They stumble in the darkness, clawing at each other, and tumble to the twin beds together, laughing. Daryl tugs at her belt, and she tugs at his, and it's a while before they manage to get their clothes off. When they finally do, Daryl flips Carol onto her stomach in the bed and nips at her neck and shoulders and squeezes her ass as she squirms against the mattress.

"Are you going to take advantage of me?" she teases.

"Mhmhm," he murmurs, settling his chin sleepily on her shoulder as he continues to caresses her bare ass with his hand. "But ya got to cooperate."

She yawns. "Cooperate? With being taken advantage of?"

"Mhmmhm," he murmurs, again. "Gotta get up on yer hand n' knees."

"Why?"

"So I can fuck ya from behind. Good n' hard. Doggie style."

"Okay," she agrees, but she doesn't move. She doesn't seem to have the energy to move. "Don't you have to get up, too?" she murmurs. "Behind me? Isn't that how that works?"

"Ya don't know how it works?"

"I've never done it doggie style."

"Mhmmhm."

She closes her eyes and feels like she's sinking into the mattress. "Have you?"

"Not witchya."

"I _know_ not with me. I mean with someone else obviously."

"Ain't no one else," he mutters and yawns. "Ain't no one else in the whole damn solar system."

"What about in the universe?"

"Mmhm. Nah. Ain't no one but m'Carol."

"No?" she asks and yawns.

"Naaaaah," he yawns.

"Naaaah," she agrees, and that's the last thing she remembers, before she wakes up chilly and naked in the middle of the night and pokes Daryl awake just long enough for both to crawl under the blanket.


	61. Chapter 61

Why are the birds singing so loudly? Carol rubs her forehead and groans. She rolls on her side to find Daryl is not beside her. He's dressed and putting his gear on his belt. "You're up _already_?"

"'S eight. Gotta go hunt." He clicks on one of his sheathes. "You?"

"I just have a couple hours of fence cleaning, and I don't have to be there until ten."

"Be fine by then," he assures her as he clips another knife to his belt. "Just hydrate."

"I also have to go to that town hall later in the afternoon and make my case for establishing that trade route to Oceanside."

"Y'll make a great case." He clips his empty holster to the other side of his belt.

"And I think we're supposed to pick up our weekly rations between one and three."

"Be back by two." He picks up his handgun from the dresser and slides it into the holster. "I'll do it."

"Did we have sex last night?" she asks.

"Best damn sex of yer life," he tells her as he swings his crossbow on his back. "Too bad you don't 'member."

"Really?"

He snorts. "Dunno," he admits. "Think we maybe started somethin' 'n didn't finish."

"Why aren't _you_ hungover? You had as much to drink as I did."

"'M bigger 'n you. 'N I got a high tolerance."

"Is that why you put up with me?"

He chuckles, comes over, and bends down to kiss her. "Love ya, Mrs. Dixon," he whispers before leaving the room.

[*]

When Daryl emerges, Garland is making tea and _whistling_. Maybe Daryl didn't get laid last night, but _someone_ definitely did. Shannon is probably still in bed, and little Gary is sitting on the couch and struggling to zip up his tiny backpack for preschool.

"Want some tea, Daryl?" Garland asks. "I was just about to make some."

"Y'all ever drink coffee?"

"We get one cup of coffee beans a month per adult. They should be in this week's rations. But Shannon and I always trade ours. They fetch a higher price than tea."

"Yeah?" Well that's one more thing he can use to buy labor. _His_ coffee beans, of course. Not Carol's. Separate accounts. Unless she _wants_ to share her beans …

Garland takes the whistling kettle off the wood stove. "Tea?"

"Nah. Thanks. Gotta get goin'." Daryl takes one step toward the door and pauses. "Hey, where'd ya get that wood stove?" He knows most of the huts and cabins were part of the historic recreation, but that stove looks much too modern.

"A Home Depot sixteen miles west. Some Jamestown scouts found it three years ago, and we've been gradually clearing it ever since. With horse and cart, though, it takes a while to haul things. It was already cleaned out of batteries and the like, but people weren't exactly looting stoves at the start."

"Anythin' left?"

"There's probably still two or three wood stoves. A few outdoor firepits. No lumber. We used that all on the gristmill and tavern. No nails or screws or solar panels or anything like that. There's some paint. Some tools. Patio furniture."

"Check it out on m' next day off," Daryl says. "Take our wagon."

"Well, it's not _your_ wagon anymore," Garland says. "You paid that as an admission fee. It belongs to the community now. So make sure you schedule its use. And if you're taking it for _private_ scavenging, there's a rental fee. Five rounds of ammo a day, a sixth an ounce of tobacco, or three ounces of jerky."

"Ya fuckin' serious?" Daryl grumbles.

"Charging a fee lets us ration its use. It also raises ammo."

"Ya ever feel like this place is just a little too legalistic?"

"I feel like this place is standing." Garland pours hot water from the kettle into his cup. "And I feel like it's stood for eight years."

"Sorry. Wasn't tryin' to sound insultin'. Y'all done great work here. Just…" He sighs. "Tryin' to get that cabin built 'n I need ammo to buy help."

"Well, you don't need it to buy _my_ help. I'm off tomorrow. As much as I'm _ever_ off. I can spare you two hours, anyway."

"Thanks, man. Thanks…hell, thanks for everythin'."

Garland laughs. "Says the man who saved my life. Twice."

"Twice?" Daryl asks.

"Daniel told me you gave him food and let him go even though he tried to steal your horse. If you hadn't…I'd most likely have been killed by those raiders."

"'M glad that worked out. Ain't always worked out, lettin' people go." Of course, Dwight is a complicated matter. Dwight killed Denise, but then he helped them defeat the Saviors later. If Daryl _had_ killed Dwight…who knows how that all would have turned out in the end. He wonders what happened to the man, if he ever found his wife, if he's still alive somewhere.

[*]

Daryl stoops down to examine the earth. "Definitely bear." He stands and looks about the forest. "If we get it," he tells Mitch, "we get to keep the hide, right?"

"Yeah. The community just gets the meat."

"Wanna turn it into a bearskin rug for when I get m'cabin built. Put it in front of the fireplace. Make love to m'wife on it." He hopes that's a big enough hint that he doesn't swing that way, and, even if he did, he wouldn't cheat on Carol. "I'll pay ya for yer share."

"You can just have it. We already have a $20,000 oriental rug in front of the fire circle in our hut."

"We?" Daryl asks.

"Me and my roommate."

"Mhm." Daryl brushes some forest debris aside with his boot to reveal a track.

"He's _just_ my roommate," Mitch clarifies. "He's straight."

"So 'm I."

"Yeah. Figured that out. And you're _very_ married. I'm just…" Mitch sighs. "Looking for a friend. I don't make them easy."

"Yeah. Me neither." Daryl whistles for Dog, who has gotten distracted by a bug. The canine yaps and sniffs down the trail of the bear.

They walk the trail quietly, until Mitch says. "You've probably never had a gay friend before though, huh?"

"Pffft. Got three back home." _Back home_. He's going to have to stop saying that. The Alliance isn't home anymore, unless Carol's long-term vision succeeds and Jamestown eventually becomes a _part_ of the Alliance.

"Really?"

"Tara. Jesus. Aaron. Aaron's like a brother to me."

"But you're never going to see them again, are you?"

"Yeah. Will. Once a year, least." He and Carol will go to that annual trade fair, he's sure, even if they have to go on horseback.

[*]

Carol rips her knife out from the walker's forehead. The creatures slumps like a dropped marionette. Dante helps her ease it off the pike, and they drag the body into the woods. When he returns to test the pike, it splinters. "Good thing I brought two spares." He picks up one from the ground and replaces the pike, after tossing the splintered halves in the woods.

While he's doing that, Carol stands guard and takes a few swigs from her canteen because her headache still lingers.

Dante picks up the second spare pike, and they walk on. "I hear you're only helping me out for three more weeks? Then you're being deputized and patrolling full-time?"

"You hear correctly."

Dante shakes his head. "Then I'm probably going to have to deal with Arnie again." They walk silently for a few yards, and he says, "I'm a little insulted you danced with everyone in the tavern last night except me."

"I danced with _three_ men. I think there were bout thirty-six there last night." And maybe fourteen women, including the waitstaff and singer.

"Did Daryl tell you that you couldn't dance with me?"

"Daryl doesn't _tell_ me anything," Carol insists. "I make my own decisions. But I respect my husband, and I take his feelings into account."

"And he doesn't _feel_ like he wants you to dance with me?" Dante asks.

"Can you blame him? You told him you were testing the waters with me."

"Damn. Do you two tell each other _everything_?"

"Everything that needs to be told, anyway."

Dante laughs and shakes his head. "He hardly ever talks when we're working. He must be completely different with you, huh?"

"No. Just more relaxed." Less on guard, Carol thinks, more _himself._ "But I know how to be quiet, too."

"Unlike me?" Dante asks with a grin. "Is that what you're saying?"

"I didn't say it." Carol smiles. "You said it."

"All right, all right. I'll be quiet for the next mile." Dante makes it about _one-eighth_ a mile. "Tell Daryl that Sarah's coming to dinner at my place tonight, if that makes him feel better."

"She said yes?" Carol draws her knife because she can see a walker in the distance, writhing on a pike and trying to push forward through it to the fence.

"Don't sound so surprised."

"I got the impression she was interested in Captain Cummings." Sarah danced with Dante at the tavern last night, but only once. She also danced once with the deputy Andrew and once with the fisherman-councilman Marcus. But she danced with the captain _three_ times.

"She had dinner with him in his cabin on the ship," Dante replies. "But she's had dinner with Andrew once, too. And with Marcus once. I guess she wants to research her options." He shrugs. "Or get a free meal every night and hoard all her rations."

Carol strides forward and slays the caught-up walker. Dante drops his pike and they peel it off together and drag the body away. He tests the bloodied pike, but it holds, so he picks up his spare and walks on.

"What do you think my chances are with her?" Dante asks. "What kinds of men does Sarah like?"

"I wouldn't know." Carol wipes the blood from her knife with a cloth, which she tucks in her back pocket before sheathing her knife.

"Well, what was her husband like? The one Daryl said died fighting saviors?"

"I didn't know him."

"Weren't you _queen_ of that place?"

The trees rustle, and Carol's knife rasps from its sheath. It's only a squirrel, and she relaxes but decides she might as well keep the knife in hand. "Not back then. I didn't know everyone."

"Does she like harmonica? I play a mean harmonica."

Carol laughs. "Does anyone really _like_ harmonica? I mean, by itself?"

Dante shrugs. "I guess it's not the best instrument for serenading a woman."

"Just be yourself," Carol assures him. "You're a friendly, funny guy. She'll have fun if nothing else."

"Well, I'm pretty sure there's going to be nothing else, at least for the first date. Andrew's already out of the running, or so I hear, because he tried for sex right away." He taps his head. "I'll learn from that bit of information."

Carol slays another walker. "There's more today. Must be because of all the noise in the tavern last night."

The pike is fractured, and Dante replaces it. His hands are now free, and they walk on. "She's going to end up with Captain Cummings," he says with a sigh. "In the end. If he really wants her, which he probably does."

"You don't know that."

"Why wouldn't he? She gorgeous. Smart. And, from what I hear, competent. I know Garland's impressed by her _insight into security_. That's what he called it."

"I mean you don't know that she'll choose the captain," Carol clarifies.

"Of course she will. He's handsome, rich, and powerful."

"Rich?"

"He went out scavenging one day – privately – not on the clock – and found one of those green ammo cases, you know, the metal ones? It must have had two hundred and fifty rounds of 5.56 NATO. He could buy her and himself a bowl of soup and pint of beer at the tavern every night for the next two weeks and _still_ not have to dip into his rations. I'm not going to win."

"Well, certainly not with _that_ attitude," Carol teases.

"So give me some pointers."

Carol laughs. "What do I know about dating women?"

"You _are_ a woman. How did Daryl first earn your affection?"

Carol rests her hand on the hilt of her knife, which she's sheathed again, and winces. "He spent countless hours searching for my lost daughter and nearly got himself killed doing it. And then when we found her…" She grits her teeth. "… _changed_ , he was the one to hold me while I broke. And then he was the one to help me put back together all the shattered pieces."

"Oh. Damn." Dante actually stays quiet for a quarter of a mile this time. Then he asks. "So you lost her one or two years ago? Your daughter?"

"Closer to eight."

"I'm confused. Didn't your husband, the king, die two years ago?"

"About," replies Carol, scanning the tree line.

"But, you weren't married to the king eight years ago, were you?"

"No."

"Were you married to _anyone_?" Dante asks.

"I was married to my first husband when I met Daryl. But Ed died before I lost my daughter."

"Was _Daryl_ married?"

Carol laughs. "God no."

"So…Daryl earned your affection almost eight years ago, when you weren't married to _anyone_. And _he_ wasn't married to anyone. But you didn't get with him until seven years later. And somewhere in there, you married the king, and he died?"

"That about sums it up."

"Well that doesn't make any damn sense at all."

"No," Carol agrees. "No, it doesn't."

[*]

Mitch and Daryl come across some wild turkey tracks, and Mitch wants to veer off the bear tracks for them. "Don't have time to track both," Daryl says. "Told Carol I'd pick up our rations at two."

"We'll pick up the bear tracks tomorrow. We know where to start now. The turkeys are closer. I can hear them."

Daryl sighs. He knows Mitch is right. They have to come back to Jamestown with something, and they've already been out for hours. "Fine. But them turkeys are skittish bastards. Be quiet."

Mitch smirks and does an Elmer Fudd imitation, holding his rifle and crouching as he moves forward. "Vewy, vewy, quiet."

Daryl chuffs. "Cut it out."

They come across a whole rafter of turkeys scavenging near the edge of the woods, and they manage to kill two. The rest scatter and vanish and Daryl loses an arrow high up in a tree trying to get a third. Dog retrieves the birds by their necks one by one and drags them to Daryl's feet.

The hunters are gloating in their victory and preparing the birds to carry when a walker lunges from amidst the trees and seizes Mitch by the arm. It bends to sink its teeth into his neck.

Dog distracts the walker with his frantic barking, and when it turns its face, Daryl takes it out with a bolt to the head.

Mitch, still reeling from the shock, catches his breath. "Sweet Jesus," he murmurs. "I thought I was a goner. Good aim there, William Tell."

Daryl rips his bolt out of the walker's head. Its close are torn up in places, and loose, but not in shreds. The pants remain on, though low at the hips. "Looks fresh. Seven, eight months at most."

"Probably another one of those raiders," Mitch tells him. "We found all but three of the bodies. Let's search its pockets. It might have some ammo on it."

The creature does, in a handgun in a holster at the small of its back, inside the pants. There's ten rounds in the magazine, and they each take five. In the front pocket of the creature's cargo pants, there's a spare magazine with another twelve rounds. They split those too.

Daryl hands him the gun. "Ya can have it, since 'm takin that hide when we get that bear."

Mitch looks the gun over. He checks the chamber and racks the slide, which he struggles to pull back. "Needs a serious cleaning, but I'll see what I can do."

Pockets full of ammo, and turkeys over their shoulders, the hunters make their happy way home.


	62. Chapter 62

A sawed-off chunk of wood clunks to the dirt. Dante and Daryl drop the two-man buck saw and swipe their sweaty brows. "As soon as I'm done with this last hour," Dante says. "You're giving me that champagne. I've got a hot date tonight."

"Two more hours for a cup of coffee beans?" Daryl picked up next week's rations after getting back from the hunt, and he's got his cup of beans for the month. Two, if Carol lets him spend hers.

Dante shakes his head.

"One 'n a half hours?" Daryl attempts.

"I don't drink coffee."

"Damn," Daryl mutters.

"But you know who does? Inola. Loves the stuff. So you can probably get some more masonry work out of her."

"Thanks for the tip." Daryl takes hold of one end of the freshly-sized log. "She married?"

Dante chuckles as he picks up the other end of the log. "Don't let Carol hear you asking that."

"Carol's the one wanted to know."

Together, they heft the log off the stand. "She was," Dante says as they drop it into the growing pile. "But he died defending Jamestown a few months ago in that aborted raid. And now she has a line of suitors out the door."

They put another unsized section of tree on the stand. "And you ain't in that line?" Daryl asks.

"Her husband was my best friend. So no."

The metal tape measure clangs as Dante rolls it out to mark the spot where they need to saw off the log.

"Ya won't come on to a dead man's wife, but y'll come onto a livin' man's?" Daryl asks pointedly.

"Well, you aren't my best friend." Dante flicks his wrist and the tape measure whirs back and snaps shut. He clips it to his belt. "And at the rate you're going, you're not likely to earn the title anytime soon."

"Trust me. Ain't lookin' to earn the title."

Dante grins and picks up his end of the bucksaw. "We'll see. I have a way of growing on people."

[*]

When Carol enters the council chambers for the open town hall at four that afternoon, in the museum where her sketch hangs on the wall, there are three rows of thirty folding chairs set up, and the council table has been placed horizontally so that all of the council members can sit on one side of it facing the audience. She takes a seat along with about twenty other people.

Garland sits at the center of the council table. To his left are Shannon, Captain David Cummings, Dr. Ahmad, and Carolyn, the veterinarian. To his right sit Marcus, the fisherman who danced with Carol at the tavern; Ana Carter, the judge and Sheriff Earl Carter's wife; a forty-something Hispanic man Carol has never met, and Barry, whom Carol met briefly while on patrol because he was leaving his hut in the Indian Village to go duck hunting.

"Who's that man, sitting the second from the right?" Carol whispers to Daniel, Daryl's former cellmate, who is sitting next to her.

"That's Ernesto Martinez. He's the farm manager."

"Town Hall, April 2, 8 NE," Garland announces, "has adjourned." At the end of the table, Carolyn, who must have been appointed the council's secretary, takes minutes on a yellow legal pad. "Please raise your hand if you have any concerns to bring to this council."

Carol's hand shoots up, but so do nineteen others. Apparently no one comes to an open town hall unless they have an issue to raise.

Garland calls on a man from the Kingdom, Samuel, who has always been a minor annoyance to Carol. He didn't volunteer for the trek to Jamestown, but was chosen in the lottery. Samuel asks for a job reassignment.

"We reassigned you three days ago," Garland says. "You're not satisfied with this job either?"

"I'd like to do something less physically demanding."

"Well, those jobs are generally reserved for pregnant women, the elderly, and people with injuries," Garland tells him with barely veiled disdain.

"Motion to deny this application," Captain David Cummings says.

Dr. Ahmad raises a finger. "Motion seconded."

"All in favor?" Garland asks.

All nine hands on the council go up.

"Your application is denied," Garland tells him, and the Kingdom man mutters something under his breath and leaves the council chambers.

The next woman to be called forward, who looks to be about six months pregnant, wants to get a court date to sue some Jamestown man for child support.

"You've been seeing three men," Dr. Ahmad says. "And there's no way to know which is the father at the moment, but it will probably be obvious after the child is born. It should at least narrow the possibilities down to two. So why don't you reapply for a court date then?"

"Because I don't want to work until then! It's hard working when you're pregnant! _He_ should be working for my rations."

"Well, child support won't start until the baby is born anyway," Shannon tells her. "And we've already put you on light duty."

"Of course _you'd_ say that," the woman grumbles. "You've got a man to work for your children's rations! I can't believe he's still expecting you to work for your _own_ when your _that_ pregnant."

"Garland works thirty hours a week as mayor," Shannon tells her coolly, "and he only gets paid half rations for that. So he works another ten hours for his rations, plus another twelve for Gary's. He doesn't need to be working for mine, too. Not _yet_."

"A court date won't be set until you have at least some evidence of who the father is," Ana tells her.

The woman shakes her head and leaves the room.

Daniel stands up next and suggests it may be time to unman the watchtower a mile beyond the gates, since they haven't seen anyone from there in months.

"You saw Daryl and Carol's group," Carolyn. "Just a week ago."

"Well, yeah…but…we'd have seen them if they came all the way to the gates, too. It just seems like a waste of manpower."

"So you want to go back to cleaning fish?" Marcus asks.

"No! I want to be on patrol. In the village."

"You had a little trouble focusing on your patrol duties last time we assigned you there," Garland notes. "You kept popping into the tavern to chat with the waitresses."

The council motions to deny his application, and the denial is unanimously approved. Daniel grumbles and leaves.

The beekeeper rises next to suggest they use some of the honey to make mead. "It takes 3.5 pounds per gallon. We're producing about three hundred and forty pounds of honey a year now. If we make twenty gallons of mead a year, that still leaves us with over 300 pounds of honey."

"Which is only eight ounces per person per year," Shannon says.

"I…" The beekeeper appears to be trying to do the math in his mind. "Maybe. If you count babies."

"Honey will soon be our primary sweetener," Shannon says. "We're running low on our sugar stores. We don't grow sugar cane. We don't have enough honey _as is_."

"We already have brew and moonshine," Captain Cummings agrees. "And with the market rationing system, through the tavern, there have been no shortages of those. I don't think we need to waste more resources on alcohol."

"I motion to deny the proposal," Ana says.

"Motion seconded," Dr. Ahmad agrees.

"All in favor of denying this motion?" Garland asks.

All nine hands go up.

"Motion denied."

The beekeeper sighs and leaves.

Given this string of denials, Carol's starting to feel nervous about her own proposal. But Emily, the Kingdom's former doctor, has better luck. She suggests tightening the limits on Benadryl. "We're down to two bottles with any possible efficacy remaining. We should save them for severe allergic reactions only."

"I motion to approve the suggestion," Dr. Ahmad say

"All in favor?" Garland asks.

All nine hands on the council go up.

A Kingdom man, Juan, is called on next, and he requests permission to expand the former whorehut. "Do you have a sketch of your plans?" Captain Cummings asks.

"Yes, sir. Captain." He walks up to the table and hands them over. The council passes them from person to person. Heads are bent as they confer, while Juan retreats a few steps.

"You don't need our approval for this," Garland says when the whispering is complete. "These plans for extension don't encroach on any private boundaries or any potential farm lands."

"My neighbors said I had to get approval," Juan replies.

"Well, they were mistaken." Garland rolls up the plans and extends them back. "Go ahead and start building. Just don't cross the lines you've drawn in these plans. Any complaints from the neighbors, direct them to me."

"Thank you." Juan takes back his plans and leaves.

Garland calls on Carol next, and she makes her case for establishing a trade route to Oceanside. "Jamestown could send a team in June to make the initial contact with Oceanside. Daryl and I would accompany them, of course, to make introductions. Then we could go again in November for the annual trade fair, when representatives of the Hilltop and Alexandria will also be there. And then maybe we could go again in April of next year. We could establish a regular trade route, three trips per year."

The farm manager, Ernesto, is skeptical that Oceanside or the other two camps could possibly have anything to offer them they don't already have.

"The Hilltop grows grapes and makes wine," Carol tells them, knowing how popular alcohol is in Jamestown. "Oceanside makes excellent fishing spears and nets. Alexandria has extra solar panels."

Shannon says, "This trip in June would be a good first step toward forming an ongoing alliance."

"Forming an alliance could also draw us into trouble," Barry replies. "Haven't these camps already been involved in multiple wars?"

"Haven't _we_?" Shannon replies.

"All the reason to avoid more," Ana agrees with Barry. "Besides we'll need a full crew for a trip of that duration and distance, and it will be hard for so many sailors to be gone for so long."

"For just three days?" Shannon asks.

"Three days there," Ana replies, "and three days back, and you know they'll want to stay on the island overnight at least one night. It will be over a week. The sailors are needed to maintain the fishing industry here. They're the ones who take the ships out to where the fish are plentiful. And June is prime fishing season, isn't it, Marcus?"

"Well…yeah…" Marcus glances at Carol. "But in November, the fish are starting to descend for warmth anyway. They're harder to catch. I personally wouldn't mind joining a trade team to Oceanside."

"You're just saying that because you're single and you've heard it's an island full of women," Carolyn says.

"I might be able to bring back crabs," Marcus insists.

Barry snorts.

"I mean the crustaceans!" Marcus clarifies. "They're all over the Chesapeake, but we don't get nearly as many down here. We could go crabbing while we're there. And easy for you to laugh, Barry. You're lucky enough to be married."

"If the fish are descending," Barry asks, "aren't the crabs?"

"Crabbing season used to be until December 31st," Marcus tells him.

"But she's proposing _three_ trips a year," Ernesto says. "One in spring and one in summer. Now those are both fishing seasons, not to mention the planting. And November is the heart of the harvest, when the fishermen become pluckers. Can we spare a team big enough to sail that far, and the rations to do it? Don't forget they won't be working, but they'll need to eat."

"Trading _is_ working," Captain Cummings insists.

"Besides, we'll eat out of the river," Marcus says. "For meat, anyway. We'll need water and vegetables or fruit. And like I said, I may come back with lots of crabs. And if they have something we don't, something we want - "

"- Like women?" Carolyn asks with a smirk.

"I'm just saying. The trip could pay for itself."

"We could lose talent," Carolyn cautions. "If our men sail there and marry their women and stay."

"Afraid of a little competition?" Marcus asks her with a smile.

"We just assimilated a great deal of talent," Captain Cummings tells his fellow councilmen. "And it won't be long before we have population pressures. It might not be a bad thing if _some_ of our men _did_ end up moving to Oceanside. And of course, it's always possible some of their women could end up moving here."

"I'm not promising any romantic relationships will develop here," Carol cautions them.

"No one thinks you are," Captain Cummings assures her. "But nature runs its course."

Ana shakes her head. "I'm still worried about foreign entanglements. Say Oceanside gets in a war, or some other camp in that alliance, and they ask for our help. What then?"

"Then we cross that bridge if and when we come to it," Garland suggests. "No one's proposing we sign a pact of mutual defense. We're talking a _trade_ agreement."

"Well, I think it's a good idea," Shannon says.

"We should at least send a team to the fall trade fair in November, when representatives of all those camps are there," Garland agrees. "We should see what they've got. Can we at least _compromise_ on that? Maybe not a trip this June, but this November? And _then_ we can decide if we want to go three times a year _next_ year."

"How are sailing conditions in November?" Carolyn asks as she leans forward to look down the table at Captain Cummings.

"Favorable, usually. Good winds. Not yet cold enough for ice."

Garland crosses his arms on the table. "Then let's go ahead and vote on the November trip for now."

"Dare I point out," Ana says, "that we'll have a new council well before November? Shouldn't we leave this decision to them?"

"I agree," Dr. Ahmad says. "And who knows how much will change between now and November? That's months away. We could be in the midst of a quarantine. Or a drought. Who knows what. I think it's an excellent idea, going to this trade fair, and I'm in favor…but let's leave the decision for October. That's still plenty of time to prepare for a November trade trip."

"I don't know," Shannon says. "I really think we should go this June. Carol's son lives there. Let the woman see her son!"

"I'm fully in favor of establishing a trade route," Captain Cummings says, "but I think Ana and Dr. Ahmad have good points. Now that I consider it...It makes more sense to make our first foray in November, when all of their communities will be present for the fair, and when our new council is settled into it role and we have a new mayor who will continue to serve for the next eight months."

"Who says we're going to have a new mayor?" Shannon asks him.

"We could. We _could_ have a new mayor. The new council might choose someone else."

" _You_ , you mean?" Shannon asks.

Garland mutters something to her underneath his breath and Shannon shakes her head but falls silent.

"Let's take this vote," Garland says. "All in favor of tabling this issue for October? At which point the council will vote on sending a team in November?"

Eight hands go up. Shannon looks up and down the table and raises hers reluctantly. "I still think we should go in June," she says, "but I'll compromise." She shoots Carol an apologetic look, but Carol's just glad the proposal is being taken seriously and seems to have the approval of the majority of the council. Henry won't expect her until November anyway, when she promised Dianne she would make the journey.

She'll have to work on persuading Ana, Barry, Carolyn, and Ernesto before October, though, if they're re-elected to the council. They all seemed to have concerns about the idea. And, who knows? In October, maybe _she'll_ be sitting behind that table, and _she'll_ get to vote on the issue.


	63. Chapter 63

Daryl and Mitch pick up the bear tracks at sunrise. They follow the trail for three hours and find the source. Daryl, who's a few yards ahead of Mitch in the forest quickly shoots an arrow into the black bear, but instead of fleeing, it turns and charges them. Dog barks frantically and veers to the side to distract the great animal, but it keeps coming straight for Daryl as he reloads. It takes three shots from Mitch's rifle before the bear falls a few feet in front of Daryl, sluffing to the earth with a strangely quiet huff and whine. Daryl slits its throat quickly with his knife.

The adrenaline is still pumping through their veins when they pull the bear back on the drag sled. "I'll take it to the butcher," Mitch says when they get through the gates. "I know you want to get to work on that cabin. You can pick up the hide later."

Daryl finds Dante coming off one of the ships, where he was making repairs, and pays him their week's rations of tobacco for four more hours of his time. They get to work sizing and sawing beneath the warm April afternoon sun.

When they sit down atop the pile of logs for a water break, Dante says, "Aren't you going to ask me how my hot date went with Sarah last night?"

"Don't give a shit."

"You should ask anyway." Dante holds a cigarette in one hand and his canteen in the other. "It's what men do. Locker room talk, you know."

"Ain't interested in yer sexploits."

"Well then you'll be interested to know the date did _not_ go well." Dante takes a swig from his canteen and a puff from his cigarette. He blows the smoke out in a stream across the well-dug rectangular dirt foundation of the cabin, which still awaits a base of stone. "I brought out the champagne. Sarah took one look at it, and asked me where I got it. I told her I earned it sawing logs for _you_ , and she said I must be some kind of jerk."

"What? Why?"

"Because she recognized that bottle as the same champagne you and Carol apparently used for the toasts at your wedding. The champagne Carol apparently has been saving for over ten months to toast your first anniversary in May. And what kind of _jerk_ would ask you to part with _that_?"

"Oh."

"You _could_ have mentioned it, you know."

Daryl shrugs. "Didn't see a reason to."

"If I knew it had sentimental value, I would have found some other way for you to pay me."

"Like what?" Daryl takes a swig of water.

"I want deerskin moccasins. I know Carol can sew. And I know you get to keep and tan your hides. So promise to make me a pair, and I'll give you back the champagne. I haven't opened it yet."

Daryl looks down at Dante's thick, sturdy brown workboots, which look like they've only been worn a year. "Don't strike me as a moccasin kind of guy."

"I'd give them to Inola."

"Thought ya said ya weren't tryin' to get in 'er pants."

"I'm not," Dante insists. "But she had a pair she loved. When we brought Atohi –her husband, my best friend – home from the battle, he was bleeding badly. She ran to him at the gate, and…he bled all over her moccasins. She couldn't get them clean. She burned them. But she misses having a pair."

"A'ight. Have to get a deer first. 'N tannin' takes time. Then the sewin'. Won't be done by my anniversary."

"Can you have it done by August? That's her birthday."

"Yeah."

"Well, then, I'll give you back the champagne tomorrow and take your word for it that the moccasins will follow."

Daryl nods and slides off the logs. "Ya ain't half bad."

Dante chuckles, tosses the butt of his hand-rolled cigarette to the ground, and grinds it out beneath his heel.

[*]

Daryl looks exhausted. He sits slumped in the armchair, staring at the fire, as Carol plays Hi-Ho-Cherry-O with Gary on the floor and Garland rubs Shannon's feet on the couch.

"You worked nonstop today, didn't you, Pookie?" Carol asks after putting two cherries in her bucket.

"Mhmmhm," Daryl murmurs. "Got that bear though. 'N we gotta lot of logs sawn."

Gary spins a two but takes off three cherries. Carol lets it slide. "With Dante's help?"

"Mhmhm. 'N Garland's."

"You gave Dante the champagne?" Carol asks.

"Yeah, but he's givin' it back." He tells her about Dante's date with Sara and the moccasins. "Ya mind sewin' 'em?"

"Of course not."

"Did you hear that, baby?" Shannon asks. "It sounds like your Kingdom crush had herself a hot date with Dante last night. I guess you're out of luck."

"Your Kingdom crush?" Carol asks as she flicks the spinner.

"Garland had lunch with Sarah today in The Tavern."

"To discuss _security_ ," Garland says. "She's very observant about deficiencies in security, and it was the only time I had available."

"The only time you had available," Shannon says. "On your _day off_?"

"Well, I had to use the practice range and clean all my guns in the morning. I helped Daryl with the cabin for two hours, and then I had to take Gary fishing like I promised. He didn't catch anything but his shirt. But we had fun, didn't we, son?"

"Fun!"

"Lunch was the only time I had to squeeze in that meeting with Sarah."

"You think she's smart and pretty," Shannon says. "You said so."

"It was merely an observation of fact, my love," Garland insists. "In response to your direct question, I might add."

"Well," Shannon grumbles, laying a hand on her protruding, pregnant belly, "it's a fact I'm as big as a house now."

"That would _not_ be a fact," he tells her. "That would be _hyperbole_."

"You're not supposed to give me a lesson in literary terminology, Garland! You're supposed to say, you're _gorgeous_. You're more beautiful than Sarah could ever _dream_ of being!"

Daryl catches Carol's eye and they share an amused smile.

"Well," Carol assures Shannon jokingly. "Sarah told me she's had dinner twice with Captain Cummins. And she's also had dinner with Marcus and Andrew. So Garland's probably safe from her snares."

"Did you hear that, baby? Sarah's got _four_ suitors."

"May the best man win," Garland replies. He squeezes her foot affectionally. "I already got my prize."

Shannon smiles. "The mystery prize between door number two. You didn't know what you might find when you married me in such a hurry. Was it as good as you hoped for?"

"Better and worse."

Shannon shakes her head. "You still require training, baby."

Gary has abandoned the board game after clearing his tree of cherries, and now he grabs a miniature ambulance from the bookshelf. He runs over and pushes the matchbox vehicle up Daryl's leg. "Fire twuck wanna pway!"

"'S an ambulance," Daryl tells him.

"Am – you – wance?"

"Ambulance," Daryl corrects him. "Used to take sick people to the hospital."

"Hah spit wul?"

"Mhmhm."

"Amyouwance hungwy! Hungwy, hungwy amyouwance!" Gary licks his lips. This has become one of the boy's favorite games to play with Daryl.

Daryl reaches into his front pocket and pulls out an empty brass shell casing he collected from the woods. He holds it out to the ambulance and says, "Nom nom nom nom nom…"

Gary howls. When his laugh titters off, he says, "Unca Dahwall's so funny!"

 **[*]**

"I wouldn't mind some evening patrols," Carol tells Sheriff Earl when she turns in the complaints she took down on her four-hour patrol of the Indian Village. "There's not a lot happening in the morning."

"When you're deputized, I'll give you night patrol twice a week, if you want it. But better you have more authority when you're working _those_ hours."

She taps the note pages she's placed on the little table in the jailhouse, which doubles as Earl's office. "Because stuff like this happens?"

"Uh oh. What?"

"There was a complaint of indecent exposure last night. A drunk man coming out of the tavern passed a couple of women standing outside their huts and chatting. He dropped his pants and told them to suck it."

Earl flushes. He's not used to having to discuss these things with a _female_ co-worker, Carol surmises.

"The women screamed, and he pulled up his pants and took off laughing. I took down the names."

Earl glances at her notes and sighs. "Damn it, Mikey," he mutters.

"What happens next?"

"Well, he's been reported once already for similar harassing behavior. He denied it, and it was a he-said, she-said sort of thing, but now that there's corroboration, he'll have a quick trial and probably get sentenced to a flogging."

"You _flog_ people here?" All Carol can think of when she hears that is the lashes on Daryl's back.

"This would probably only be two or three lashes. I know flogging sounds old school, but it's efficient. It doesn't require many resources. It doesn't take anyone off of work duty like incarceration would. And it sends a clear message. What would you suggest we do instead?"

"I don't know," she admits. "Half rations, maybe? Unpleasant job assignments?"

"What did you do in the Kingdom, when this sort of thing happened?"

"This sort of thing _didn't_ happen," Carol replies instinctively and a little defensively. But then she thinks about it and admits, "Well, _once_ there was a drunken groping. The woman who got groped – she beat-up the groper with her staff."

"Which prevented a repeat of the behavior, I presume?" Sheriff Earl asks.

"Yes." It also prevented the man from walking comfortably for about three days.

"So it's just a flogging without a trial, then?" Sheriff Earl asks.

"I guess you could see it that way," Carol concedes. "But it didn't have the approval of the government behind it."

"So you punished the woman for beating up her groper?"

"No. Of course not."

"Then it had the approval of the government."

"Maybe," Carol admits. "It's a challenge, I suppose, running a community this large. It's a good thing you have a council. Do you think your wife will run for re-election in July?" Ana seemed reticent about establishing that trade route to Oceanside.

"Yes, she plans to. Can she count on you for your vote? You'll be a citizen by then."

Carol smiles faintly and makes a noncommittal nod of sorts. She has no idea who's she's going to vote for, and this is probably not the best time to announce that _she's_ thinking of running, too.


	64. Chapter 64

Dog sits by the fallen deer and wags his tail as Daryl field dresses the kill. It took two days to track the animal, but they finally got it. Daryl digs inside and yanks out the organs while Mitch stands guard, one hand on his hip and the other hand on the strap of his rifle. "You took the bear hide, and now you want this one, too?"

"Need it to make moccasins. Look, I'll tan it m'self, 'n then give ya whatever leather's left over after the shoes."

" _You're_ going to wear _moccasins_?" Mitch asks skeptically.

Daryl shakes the excess blood from his hands and then yanks the cloth from his back pocket to wipe them. "Nah. Gonna give 'em to Dante to pay 'em for some work he did. 'N he's gonna give 'em to Inola."

"Oh. That makes more sense. Men are always giving her things. They're all hoping to score now that Ahoti's dead."

"Don't think Dante's tryin' to score. Think maybe he just…cares."

[*]

Carol pokes her needle into a pair of Gary's pants and tugs it through. Daryl slides a red checker into the Connect Four game. "I win," he says and shows Gary the vertical column of four red checkers he's created.

Gary drops a yellow checker in on top of Daryl's column of four. "Now I win!"

"Ain't how it works."

"I win! I win!" Gary claps and slaps the lever so all the checkers fall out the bottom.

Carol chuckles.

Shannon has fallen asleep on the couch reading a book, and Garland is out late at some meeting with Sheriff Earl.

Daryl rubs his eyes, stands from the floor, and flops into the arm chair while Gary puts away the game.

"You look _tired_ , Pookie."

"Yeah, but I almost got all 'em logs cut 'n sized."

"I'll help you tomorrow after work."

"Nah. Know ya got cookin' 'n washin' 'n sewin'."

Carol handles most of the domestic duties for not only her and Daryl, but also Shannon and Garland. She does it to lighten Shannon's load in her pregnancy and to say thank you for the roof over their heads. "Still, I can squeeze in – "

"- 'M buildin' this for ya," Daryl insists. "Y'll help with the inside when 'm done. Make it…ya know. Nice. Like ya do."

Carol smiles a little sadly. She remembers Daryl coming into Dale's trailer, back on Hershel's farm, after she'd cleaned the place up for Sophia's hoped-for return and to distract herself from the worry. She remembers Daryl's eyes when he looked around, barely recognizing the place, and his gentle assurance when he left: _She's gonna really like it in here._

If Daryl wants to build this cabin for her, without her help, then she'll let him. And she'll make it a home inside, the kind of home he's probably always secretly longed for –unpretentious but homey, ordered, neat, and warm, with a woman's touch, but space for a man. "Well, you're welcome to my monthly ration of coffee beans to buy labor," she tells him. "And all of my tobacco. I'll give you six rounds of ammo each week, too."

"Thanks. Inola wants them coffee beans. Already gonna give me one hour for the pint. Get more with the beans."

"It's strange she's a mason but lives in a straw adobe."

Daryl shrugs. "Don't need nothin' big. 'S just 'er now. 'N she built her own chimney 'n there." Most of the adobes just have a stone circle for fire and the smoke vent through a hole in the roof that is covered when the fire's not in use. "Real nice stone hearth."

"You've been _in_ her hut?" Carol asks.

"Had lunch there today."

"I…" Carol's not sure what to make of that. She wasn't aware they'd become friends, and she hates the unjustified jealousy that pricks her suddenly. "Why?"

"Invited me 'n Dante to talk 'bout the cabin 'n what type of rocks 'n bricks I need for the foundation."

"Oh. A _working_ lunch?"

"Mhm. 'N Dante measured her spare boots when she wasn't lookin'. For the moccasins." He pats his front shirt pocket. "Got the numbers for ya to sew 'em, once that hide is tanned." The champagne has already been returned and sits again on their dresser, awaiting their anniversary in late May.

"How old is she?" Carol asks.

"Who?"

"Inola, obviously."

"Hell would I know?"

"Well, how old do you think she _looks_?" Carol asks.

"Dunno. Thirty-five? Forty-one? Why?"

"She's pretty. Don't you think?"

"I ain't fallin' into your trap."

Carol laughs.

Gary returns from the bookshelf after putting away the game with a piece of rope and begins playing tug-o-war with Dog. Shannon blinks awake, rolls over onto her back on the couch, and falls back asleep.

"On patrol tomorrow?" Daryl asks.

"Just three hours," Carol replies. "Then I think I'm going to go watch the open town hall."

"Why?" he asks. "Thought they'd tabled that decision for October."

"Just to watch. I figured I should know more about how the council operates if I run for council."

" _What?_ "

She nods to the sleeping woman on the couch. "Shannon suggested I consider it."

"We ain't been here but ten days. 'N them elections're what… less 'n three months away?"

Carol shrugs. "I didn't say I'd decided for _sure_ that I'm running. But it can't hurt to get to know more about how these things go. Or to get to know as much about the citizens of Jamestown and their wants and needs as I can."

" _Pfft._ Yeah, right, ya ain't decided for sure. Yer _definitely_ runnin'."

"You don't think I should?"

"Think ya'd make a great councilwoman. And they'd be damn fools not to elect ya."

Carol smiles. "You could run, too."

"Pffft."

"What? Why not? You were on the council at the prison. You were on my council of advisors. You advised Tara and Jesus and Aaron at the Hilltop, too. You'd have a lot to offer."

"Dunno. Ain't gonna run this time, anyway."

That's probably for the best, Carol thinks. It would look a tad over-ambitious if they both ran for Council, as if the Kingdom was trying to take over Jamestown.

"Daddy!" Gary yells when the front door opens. He drops the rope in mid tug and startled Dog plunks down on his haunches.

Garland sweeps up Gary into a hug and then sets him back on his feet. He nods to Daryl and Carol, walks behind the couch, and bends down to kiss Shannon on the forehead. She stirs awake and he says, "Go to bed, darling."

"I don't know why I'm so tired all the time," she says as she gets up off the couch.

"You're growing a baby," Carol reminds her.

"I wasn't this tired with Gary. But this one's a kicker." Shannon's hand drops to her belly. "Wakes me up four times at night. And I'm getting Charlie horses this time around. They wake me up, too."

When she's vanished, Garland slumps down on the couch with a sigh. Gary crawls up next to him and leans against his side. The little boy puts his arm next to Garland's arm and asks, "Why I'm bwown" he pokes his own light black arm, "and you not vewy bwon, Daddy?" He pokes Garland's pale arm. "And mommy not vewy bwon."

"Well, God makes people in all different colors."

"Why?"

"It's more interesting that way."

Gary's little face scrunches up as he ponders this bit of information. "Unca Dahwall not vewy bwown. Ant Cawol not vewy bwon. Mister Mitch bwon but he not my daddy. Mister Dante bwon but he not my daddy."

"No."

Gary tilts his head up and grins at Garland. "You my daddy!"

"That's right." Garland puts an arm around Gary's shoulders and squeezes him tight.

"I love Daddy."

"I love you, too, son. Let's get you to bed."

 **[*]**

Seven spring days pass quickly in Jamestown. The deer and bear skins have been cleaned, salted, and soaked and now hang tanning. Stacks of logs sit beneath protective tarps by the cabin building site, and the red bricks and white and gray rocks Daryl spent his last day off scavenging are piled alongside them.

Now Daryl slathers mortar on a flat rock while Inola, who has pulled her long black hair into a pony tail, uses a hammer and chisel to break another to shape. Daryl stands and takes the shaped rock from her and lays it atop the slathered one as she puts another rock on her makeshift work table.

"How many layers ya think we need?" Daryl asks as he presses down and holds. He's planning on three, but she's the mason, after all.

"With rocks this size, I recommend four. You have plenty of rocks for it. If you give me your leftovers, I'll give you an hour on the chimney later. You're using the brick for that?"

"Yeah."

Dante walks by Daryl shaking p a water bottle full of red liquid and a floating powdery substance. He sets it on Inola's work table. Inola puts her hammer and chisel down, picks up the bottle, and squints at it. "Is this what I think it is?"

Dante grins. "Kool Aid. You said red was your favorite when you were a kid, right?"

" _Blue_ , but I certainly won't turn down red." She unscrews the cap and takes a sip. "Not bad."

"Sugar lasts forever."

"Where'd you find it?"

"Out scavenging in some houses. I have about eighteen more packets. Just pop by my hut sometime, and I'll trade you something for it. That one's on the house."

"Thank you. I'll come by after dinner today." Inola raises an eyebrow and smiles. "Unless _Sarah's_ going to be there?"

Dante sighs. "Ah, no. Carol talked to her and explained I didn't know about the importance of the champagne but…" He shrugs. "Sarah's seeing Captain Cummins again tonight. It's their _fourth_ date. I'm pretty sure he's going to ask her to be exclusive, and she'll probably say yes."

Inola pouts. "Sorry, Big Bear. At least you beat out Andrew and Marcus."

From where he's kneeling slathering more mortar on a brick, Daryl snorts.

"What's so funny?" Dante asks him.

"Nothin', Big Bear," Daryl mutters with a smirk.

"Well at least I'm a _big_ bear. Not _tiny_ like Pookey."

"What?" Daryl barks.

Dante laughs. "Yeah, I've heard Carol call you that. _Pookey_. That was that tiny teddy bear Garfield had in the comics."

Is _that_ where Carol got the name from? "Shut up," Daryl grunts.

Inola chuckles.

"See you later," Dante tells her and walks on. She drains the Kool Aid before resuming her chiseling.

 **[*]**

The council chambers / museum empties out after an open town hall. Carol lingers and looks at the displays again. She's reading the one on Garland's early work as the second sheriff of Jamestown when Garland comes to stand beside her. "I think Shannon embellished a few things in this narrative," he says.

"You're not a modern-day Sherlock?" Carol asks with a smile.

He chuckles. "So…I've noticed you've attended the last four open town halls." Town halls are held early Monday morning, late Wednesday afternoon, and Fridays around lunchtime, to accommodate people's varying work schedules, but Carol's managed to attend them _all_. "But you only raised an issue at the one last week."

"Are spectators not allowed?"

"They're welcome. We've just never _had_ a spectator before. These sorts of details usually bore people. Unless they want something from the Council, they don't come."

"I'm interested to see how the government operates."

She's also interested in seeing how the potential competition operates. She's figured out, for instance, that Marcus the fisherman is agreeable to eighty percent of citizen's requests, and Ana the judge is disagreeable to eighty percent of them – or at least _appears_ to be so. She's skeptical, asks a lot of questions, but then votes about 60-40 in favor of citizen's requests. Shannon on the other hand, is friendly with the citizens, encouraging of them, but is more likely to vote 55-45 _against_ their requests, so that they leave feeling like she supports them even when she doesn't give them what they want. Captain Cummins seems indifferent to issues not involving the ships, the fishing industry, defense, or water routes, and he just goes with the majority in those cases. Garland is a quiet observer, but the most likely to raise a contrasting point. Barry is a jokester and unpredictable in his voting habits. Carolyn typically waits for everyone else to vote to raise her hand, and Dr. Ahmad is quick to second any motion, even if it's one he plans to vote against.

She's learned what kind of things bother the citizens most, which citizens are the problem children, and which seem to have good ideas and might one day end up making bids for the council themselves.

"And I was wondering," she says, "could I see the charter? I'd like to study it."

"Certainly. It's in the filing cabinet over here." He leads her to a free-standing green metal cabinet and pulls out a drawer. "This top drawer is never locked. Feel free to come in here any time the room's not closed for deliberations. These are all copies. The originals are under lock and key." He rifles through the folders. There's a copy of the original charter, the revised charter with the old captain's changes, and then the new charter we adopted this past July."

"What else is in these cabinets?" There's a gray metal cabinet next to the green one. They obviously hold more than the original charters.

"The letters and journals of those who have died. And closed case files of the sheriff's office. You can read any of those if you like, but I'll have to unlock it for you, and you need to tell me when you're done so I can re-lock it. Nothing can leave this room."

"I think I'll just start with the charter."

Garland nods. "Well, have fun. I have to get to the stables and muck some stalls."

"The mayor is mucking stalls?"

"I have to work for Gary's rations. At least the baby won't need rations for a while. We have everything we need, and it won't be on solids until…what is it? Seven months?"

"I don't remember. You've done this much more recently than I have."

"I thought you adopted Henry when he was ten?"

"I had a daughter," she tells him quietly. "In the old world."

"I'm sorry for your loss," he replies solemnly, and then he leaves her alone to study.

[*]

Tonight, the oil lamp burns low on the nightstand. Carol snuggles up to Daryl in bed after making love and breathes in. "You smell so good."

"Got real muddy huntin', so I took m'weekly hot shower." They usually just spot wash using the outdoor troughs or the washbasin on their dresser. On a really sweaty day, they might dunk themselves in the river. "Had some weird soap 'n there. 'S tan 'n rough, like it had sand 'n it or some shit."

"Well, it smells good."

He yawns. "Ya off tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Why?"

He yawns again. "'Cause 'm gonna take ya shoppin'."

"Shopping?"

He doesn't respond.

"Daryl, what do you mean, _shopping_?"

Daryl snores lightly through his nose.


	65. Chapter 65

Daryl waits in the driver's seat as Carol slides a rifle into the grips on the back of the bench, checks the safety on her handgun, and situates her longbow and quiver on her shoulder before climbing up and taking the shotgun seat next to him. He shouts a "Hi-ya" to Lancelot and Guinevere, cracks the driver's whip, and the horses trot off through the open gate of Jamestown, pulling the Kingdom's empty wagon behind them.

"Had to pay five rounds to rent our own damn wagon for the day," Daryl mutters as the gates close.

"Well, we did get an awful lot of housing for our people in exchange for this wagon."

"Yeah," he agrees reluctantly.

"So…are you going to tell me where we're going?"

He might as well let the cat out of the bag, or she won't stop pestering him. "Home Depot."

"Sounds romantic," she says with a teasing smile.

"Gonna let ya pick out a wood stove for the cabin." They'll put it in storage until the cabin's built. "Maybe get some porch furniture."

"The cabin's going to have a porch?" she asks, her eyes lighting up with excitement.

"Uh…meant furniture for the livin' room." Outdoor furniture is built for the dust of years, after all, and the furniture at Home Depot is less likely to be infested than a couch they might find in a house. "But I can build ya a porch, if ya want."

"I don't need a porch," she says.

He's suddenly uneasy about his plans and afraid of disappointing her. Constructing a cabin from scratch with the intermittent help of other people is no easy task. "Ain't gonna be big, ya know," he mutters. "The cabin."

"You remember I used to live in a tent, right? And then a prison cell?"

"Yeah. 'N then a McMansion."

"I never felt at home in Alexandria."

"Just gonna be a one-room cabin." He peers at her out of the corner of his eye, but this news doesn't seem to disappoint her.

"I'm sure that will make it easier to heat in the winter and cool in the summer. And it's not like we have kids who are gone walk in on us while we're screwing around."

"Could close off the bedroom, though," he tells her. "Put up a room divider like they got in the old whorehut."

"Or we could use drapes. I think that might be more attractive. Home Depot's got rods and curtains and drapes. I'll find something I like. I'm sure the cabin will be perfect. Cozy. I _love_ cozy." She turns to him and smiles.

He catches that smile like a ray from the sun.

"How far is it?" she asks. "The Home Depot?"

"Sixteen miles." That will probably take three hours at the pace they're going. They'll rest and water the horses when they get there, eat lunch, shop, load up, and be back by sunset.

She smiles again – that really pretty smile that means she's _happy_. "I've never gotten to pick out my own stove."

"Ain't gonna be a lot of choice," he warns her. "Garland said maybe three left."

"But," says Carol, her eyes twinkling with excitement, "it's going to be _my_ choice."

Daryl ducks his head and grins, glad to have made her happy.

[*]

Dead walkers litter the parking lot of the Home Depot. There's not a single one trapped in a car – they've all been dragged out and killed, and the trunks are popped and doors opened. Jamestown has already emptied the vehicles of anything worthwhile, Carol's sure. She hopes the store is more promising.

Rain-battered bags of decomposed mulch slump in wet piles by the doorway. The front door is smashed wide open, and they walk the horses inside and tether them to a pole by a cash register.

"Ya stay with 'em," Daryl tells her. "I'll clear the place real quick."

While Daryl sweeps through the whole store with his crossbow poised, Carol pours water in tin pans for the horses and temporarily blocks off the open front door with the wagon on the outside and three strings of barb wire across the opening, in case a walker should attempt to enter while they're shopping. Looting places used to be easier when they didn't have the horses to protect.

By the time she's done, Daryl has returned to announce the place is walker-free. They eat a quick, light lunch of dried apples, walnuts, deer jerky, and water, and then they each grab a flat dolly on wheels and begin to push them through the store. They pass the weed whackers and lawnmowers, which have been overturned and ripped apart for electrical parts. The shelves that usually line the outer perimeter of the store with lumber are completely empty. "When was the last time Jamestown was here?" she asks.

"Six months ago."

"Think it's been looted since then?"

"Nah. Still got stuff. Saw it when I's clearing."

They go out a second set of busted sliding glass doors to the covered garden section. There are no seeds or fertilizer or pesticides or gardening sand, but there's still plenty of porch furniture.

Carol sits down in a peeling white rocking chair and pushes off the cement floor.

"Want it?" Daryl asks.

"I don't think so."

"Lots of others. Like any?"

Carol smiles because he seems to desperate to please her. She stands and pats him on the ass before going to try out more furniture. Daryl leans against the frame of a porch swing and watches her. She sits down in a dark brown wicker rocking chair and pushes off the ground. "I want this one," she declares.

"Sold." Daryl loads it onto a dolly.

She tries out the rest of the porch furniture and settles on a three-piece set that includes a couch, large chair, and coffee table that opens to reveal storage space. The base of the furniture is a dark brown wicker, and the cushions are – or rather were – white, before they yellowed with time.

"Don't want the one with the blue cushions?" he asks. "Don't look as…yellow."

"I'll make cushion covers. It's the rest of the look of the furniture I like." She bends down and slides a wicker basket drawer out from beneath the couch. There's a drawer under each cushion. "And look. Extra storage room. And it's comfy." She sits down and pats the cushion next to her. He plops down and a cloud of dust floats up and they both cough. "I'll wash the cushions before I cover them," she assures him.

"Wanna pick a kitchen table?"

Her eyes flit around at the patio furniture. "I think it's all too big."

Daryl points to a small circular, glass-top table in an iron base with two black iron chairs. "Maybe that'un?"

"We can't have Garland and Shannon over for dinner if we only have a two-person table."

"Build ya one, then."

He doesn't need to be building them still more things. He's already building the cabin and planning to build a bed frame, too. "On second thought, let's take that one. I like it. And if we have guests, we can be casual and sit and eat in the living room. But it will be perfect for the two of us."

"A'ight." Daryl loads up all the furniture on two dollies, and they roll them to the front door, leave them there, and take another two empty dollies.

As they move on, loading things onto the two dollies they're pushing, Daryl snatches up a lonely, forgotten box of nails that didn't get looted. He also picks up a few tools of his own and piles them into a metal toolbox. There are still a few smaller tools left in the aisle - hammers, screw drivers, pliers, and other odds and ends. "Should have our own," he says. "For fixin' up stuff 'round the cabin. 'Stead of checkin' out the community's tools all the time."

In the bathroom section, Carol spies a vanity she adores, with a copper wash basin standing on a dark granite counter.

"'S take it if ya love it," Daryl tells her.

"That's silly. We don't have any plumbing."

"Gonna need a washin' bowl, though." He opens the cabinet doors. "Could take out that part of the pipe, but a bucket under it. Pull the plug 'n drain the dirty water into it."

"It's going to look strange without a bathroom though, just…sitting there. And it would take up too much room in the bedroom. We should put a wash bowl on top of our dresser."

"Ya want _this_ wash bowl?"

"Well, the problem is that it's attached to the – "

Before she can finish her sentence, he's got his tools out of the toolbox and is detaching the basin from the vanity. She doesn't have the heart to tell him that while she loves that copper bowl in _combination_ with the overall vanity, it's going to look strange on a dresser. So she just thanks him and kisses his cheek and adds the bowl to the dolly when he gets it off.

In the kitchen section, Carol looks over the models. They've all been torn apart for the cabinets. "I think this is where Shannon and Garland got their stools," she says, pointing to one of the models, which still has a kitchen island remaining. "Too bad there are no cabinets left. I'd love a few cabinets in the kitchen nook."

"Dante introduced me to a cabinet maker. Said he'd take three weeks of tobacco to make 'em."

" _Really_?"

"Yeah. Gonna save up our 'bacco 'n get ya 'zactly what ya want."

"I'm feeling a little spoiled," she says.

"Well…'m feelin' like spoilin' ya." He grins. "Truth is, I ain't never had two dimes to rub together. Never thought I'd have shit to offer a woman. But I can give ya all this. I can actually _do_ it."

Carol wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him. The kiss starts gentle, but it doesn't remain gentle. Daryl explores her mouth with his tongue as his hands wander up and down her back. They ravish each other's mouths, coming up only for short breaths. Excited by his unexpected fervor, and giddy with the joy of shopping for their own home, she moans and pushes against him.

Daryl backs her against a model kitchen counter and nips at her neck. She stretches it so he can nip and suck and kiss more easily, and she squirms beneath his hungry assault. "Daryl," she murmurs when he cups a breast through her shirt and squeezes. "We should…"

"Should what?" The question is a throaty murmur. He circles her nipple with his thumb. Even through her shirt and bra, it responds, growing hard.

"We should probably…" She breathes and swallows.

He rakes his teeth over her ear lobe, and she shivers. His voice is low and hungry and sends heat rushing all over her body: "Probably what?"

"Fuck," she says. "We should probably fuck."

"Hell yeah." He steps back and starts undoing his belt, and she scrambles to unbuckle her own. She expects him to lift her onto the counter, the way he's taken her on the teacher's desk in the Kingdom a few times, but instead he tells her, "Turn 'round." She does, and he says, "Hands on the counter."

She lays her palms flat on the cool gray marble and can hear his belt clattering as he pulls his pants down to his knees. Then her pants and underwear are tugged down, and his lips are back on her neck, his breath hot in her ear. With a hand on the inside of her bare thigh, he positions her so he can drive in from behind. She cries out in pleasure when he does, and then he puts both of his hands down atop hers on the counter.

It's quick and hungry, with grunts and moans, but not so quick she doesn't cum just before he spills over. They're both half panting and half laughing when Daryl stumbles off her.

Hurriedly, Carol yanks her pants and underwear back up and zips and buckles. It takes Daryl a little longer to recover well enough to manage to do the same, but once he does, they both lean back against the counter and finish catching their breath.

"That was stupid," she says. "We shouldn't do that in an unsecure location."

"Hey, yatold me to."

"I know."

He smiles at her. "Damn. Guys always bitch 'bout shoppin' with their girls. Take ya shoppin' _anytime_."

"Well that's not happening next time," she assures him. She chuckles. "I told you before we were married that I might like to just fuck sometimes. And you didn't _believe_ me."

"'Cause it wasn't true. _Then_."

"I suppose you're right. I needed to be at a certain point in the relationship first. And this is still not going to be a regular thing, you know."

"Mhmhm." He ducks his head and grins.

"Come on." She pushes off the counter she's leaning against. "Let's keep shopping." They push the dollies onward past the paint section. Jamestown has already cleaned it out. "What are we doing for a mattress? I know you're building a frame, but are we going to try to find a mattress that isn't infested?"

"Gonna buy one from the storehouse. Jamestown's got six left. Still in plastic. Looted a couple mattress stores two years ago. Garland said it'll just cost me an off-the-clock deer or two wild turkeys."

They pause by the home décor section and Carol looks over the curtain rods. Daryl pulls out a much-folded piece of paper where he's written down the measurements for the cabin. She chooses two rods to join together in an L that, with the walls, will cordon off the bedroom. Then she picks out some heavy curtains, a mirror, some lighter curtains for the cabin windows, an area rug, three wall sconces for holding candles, and a black iron hearth tool set, with stand, poker, shovel, broom, and prongs. Daryl waves a finger at the Celtic knot decorating the top of the stand. "'S cool."

"My people were Scotch-Irish. Yours?"

"Hell would I know?"

"Dixon is Scottish. What was your mom's maiden name?"

"Fischer."

"That's German."

"Ain't no countries no more," he says as they load her selections on the dolly.

"Not that we know of, anyway. But we don't really know what happened to the rest of the world, do we?"

"Hell, if our military couldn't beat it back, think theirs could?"

"What if their scientists did?"

"Pfft."

"What if the rest of the world is going on as normal and has basically just quarantined the American continent?"

Daryl puts his arms into pushing the now heavy dolly. "Guess we'll never know. Less'n ya wanna try to convince Captain Cummins to sail the _Susan Constant_ to Africa."

"I don't think so. I'm going to have a hard enough time convincing the council to sail it to Oceanside three times a year."

When they get to the wood stoves, there are exactly three left. Carol scans them over and quickly picks one.

"Damn," Daryl says. "Thought this was gonna take all day. I like how ya shop!"

"Well, I just picked the most expensive one. See." She plucks up the price sign, which reads, $837.99.

"Yer in luck. 'Cause I wasn't gonna let ya spend $838."

Even with as much jigsaw-like finagling as Daryl does, he can't fit everything in the wagon. They opt to leave behind the rocking chair and the kitchen table and chairs. "Ya didn't really want that table," Daryl reasons.

"I really liked that rocking chair, though," she says with a pout.

"'S make a second trip next week," Daryl says. "Get that 'n the other two wood stoves for Jamestown. Someone's gonna need 'em 'ventually. Get us a fire pit, too."

"You don't mind coming back?"

He grins. "I like shoppin' witchya."

As she climbs up onto the bench to sit shotgun, she says, "I _told you_ that's not happening again."

But when Daryl takes the driver's seat, he's chuckling like he doesn't believe her.


	66. Chapter 66

The journey back to Jamestown takes longer, because the horses can't move as fast with all the weight to pull. Daryl repeatedly scans the road for threats as he drives. They're two miles from Jamestown when he spies a walker lurching out from among some abandoned cars. "Three o'clock."

Carol loads her bow and shoots, and the arrow sails into the walker's forehead. Daryl slows the wagon to a stop so she can recover her spent arrow and waits for her to search the walker. She unclips something from its belt. When she climbs back onto the bench, she says, "I just keep getting lucky today. I got two spare magazines, both full, twelve rounds each. Nine millimeter. No gun, though. It's probably in the woods somewhere."

"Must be that last raider. They didn't find all the bodies." Daryl spurs the horses onward.

"Since I hit the jackpot, I'm taking you out to dinner at the tavern when we get back." There's no time to cook, and Shannon and Garland have probably already eaten.

"Oh, so yer claimin' all them bullets for yerself?" he asks.

"I _did_ shoot and search the walker."

"'Cause I's drivin!"

"Fine. We'll split them. Twelve each."

"Good. Takin' ya out to dinner at the tavern."

Carol shakes her head and laughs.

[*]

It's after sunset by the time Daryl gets all their goodies into one of the Jamestown storage rooms and labeled with signs that read: _Property of Mrs. Dixon_. They walk by lantern light to the tavern.

Inside, fire crackles beneath a black cauldron. Candles flicker in sconces on the walls, in a chandelier, and on the few occupied tables. There's no live music tonight, so the tavern isn't crowded. There are four lonely men sitting at the bar, all trying to flirt with the waitresses. Captain Cummins sits at one table drinking with Sarah, while the Kingdom's former doctor Emily and her husband George are both polishing off bowls of soup at another. Dante drinks and laughs at a four-person table with Inola and Inola's brother, whose name Carol doesn't know.

Dante raises his pint glass to them when they walk in, and they stop by his table to say hello.

"Buy me a pint for another hour of masonry?" Inola asks Daryl. "I'm empty."

"Nah. Still got two hours ya owe me. Buy more when I need more."

She sighs.

"I'll buy you a pint, gorgeous!" calls a man at the bar.

Inola cranes her neck back to look at him. "Just as long as you know you aren't getting anything in return for it."

"Then never mind," the man mutters.

Dante chuckles. "I'll buy you a pint, Inola." He waves to Candy, who comes over and takes all three of their empty pint glasses. "Just refill hers and mine and put it on my tab," Dante tells her. "I'm not buying for this guy." He points to Inola's brother. When Candy disappears, he tells Daryl and Carol, "Pull up an extra chair. Join us."

They do, and Inola introduces her brother Adahy.

"Adahy?" Carol repeats to make sure she has the pronunciation.

He nods. "It's Cherokee. It means _lives in the woods_."

"But ya _don't_ live in the woods," Daryl says.

"No, I share a one-room hut with this non-pint-buying asshole." Adahy points directly at Dante. "Who ignores the sock tacked beside the doorway."

"It was dark," Dante insists. "I didn't _see_ it."

"You saw something, though, didn't you?"

Dante leans closer to Inola. "This is a humble brag, because your brother got laid last night."

" _Who_?" Inola asks.

"Anika," Adahy tells her.

"One of the Kingdom women," Dante explains. "She's only twenty-one."

"Jesus, Adahy!" Inola exclaims. "That's _half_ your age."

"Not quite. And she's very mature," Adahy says. "She's Indian."

"Really?" Inola asks skeptically.

"I mean she's from India," Adahy replies. He pushes back his chair. "Well, if no one's buying me another pint, I'm heading home. And if there's a sock tacked beside the doorway when you get back, Dante, you better not part those beads. Take a long walk."

Carol and Daryl re-situate the chairs when Adahy's gone, so that it's not so crowded and there's one person on each side of the square card table. "How come ya got a tab," Daryl asks Dante, "and I gotta pay in advance?"

"I usually pay by fixing things around the tavern. I can't really do that in the dark. I'll do it tomorrow."

"Dante always wanted to be a carpenter," Inola says.

"But I became a lumberjack because the company was giving health care benefits and I needed coverage for my boy. He had sickle cell disease."

The statement hits Carol like a slap. She sometimes forgets that most people had entire families before the world ended. She can't envision Dante with a child, thinking about health insurance policies.

Trisha, the other waitress, sets down Dante and Inola's refilled pints. "What can I get you other two?"

"What's the soup?" Carol asks. "It smells good."

"Potato and bear meat stew. We've also got bear steaks today. We grill them outside. Six ounces, and it comes with a side of collard greens."

"How much ammo that cost?" Daryl asks.

"Five rounds for the soup. Seven for the steak."

"I'll have the soup," Carol says.

"'N I'll get the steak," Daryl replies.

"Anything to drink?"

"Uh…" Daryl's just spent his twelve rounds on the food.

"Yes, a pint for each of us," Carol says. "On me." She'll have to get the tip, too, for both of them.

Daryl starts counting out his ammo, but the waitress says he can pay after the meal. "We know you're good for it now." Daryl slips the magazine back in his pocket.

Dante raises his pint glass to Inola and says, "To your late husband, a man among men, and a true hero. I miss that asshole every damn day."

Inola smiles a little sadly. "To Atohi," she agrees, and clinks his glass. Then she tells Daryl, "The bear steaks are great. I had one last night."

"On your hot date with the farmer?" Dante asks. "How'd that go?"

She shrugs. "The steak was great."

Dante snorts. "That bad, huh?"

"I let him make out with me for a few minutes, and let's just say I was underwhelmed. So I called it a night."

"No second date?" Dante asks.

"I don't think so."

"Good." Dante sets his pint glass down. "It's too soon, anyway. Atohi would be rolling over in his grave."

"Atohi is dead," she tells him. "And he would want me to be happy." She turns to Carol. "So, what sort of hearth style do you prefer?"

They talk about various possible designs and patterns for the chimney and hearth for the cabin until Daryl and Carol's food arrives. Carol steals a bite of Daryl's steak, and he steals a bite of her stew.

"Hate payin' for this when I killed 'n skinned it," Daryl mutters.

"You got paid rations for your work," Carol reminds him.

"So y'all need to vote for Inola in July," Dante tells them.

" _Dante_ ," scolds Inola, sounding embarrassed.

"What? You're obviously not going to campaign for yourself. _Someone_ needs to. It's not enough just to throw your name in on the ballot."

"Oh?" Carol asks. "You're running for Town Council?"

"Well...they don't have any _builders,"_ Inola replies. _"_ No one to represent the workmen."

"They don't have enough women, either," Carol tells her. "I'm glad you're running."

"Well, I hope you wouldn't vote for someone just because she's a woman," Inola says.

Dante shakes his head. "This is not how you campaign."

"I mean I'm just glad to see the involvement," Carol clarifies. "I'm going to have to consider the candidates carefully, of course. What are some of your ideas?"

"I think we need to start letting some of the workmen work for rations by building more housing, to prepare for growth. It's too expensive for people to build their own huts and cabins. I mean…Daryl's managing it, obviously. But he's a workhorse."

"Got m'vote," Daryl tells her.

"Who else is going to run?" Dante asks. "Do you know?"

Daryl glances at Carol, but she shakes her head slightly to tell him not to mention that she's considering it. It's too soon to announce that. They aren't even officially citizens until next week.

"Mayor Barron, of course," Inola says. "But Shannon said she's not going to run for re-election this time. Neither is Marcus."

 _Well damn_ , Carol thinks. Marcus was in favor of establishing the trade route to Oceanside, and she was counting on his vote in October when the council re-considers the issue. "Why not?" she asks.

"He doesn't like having to work fifteen to twenty hours a week on the council and only getting half-rations for it. But I think everyone else on the council is going to run for re-election."

Carol dips her spoon into her bowl. "Anyone new running?"

"Lieutenant James Witherspoon."

That was the lieutenant who bought her and Daryl a pint. "He's young."

"Nineteen is the minimum age to run for council," Inola tells her, which Carol already knows because she studied the charter.

"But he's not old enough to be mayor, is he?" Carol asks. She knows that position requires a minimum age of twenty-five.

"No. He's only twenty-four, so even if he gets elected to the council, he can't be on the ballot for mayor this year. I think most of the council will decline to be on that ballot, except Mayor Barron, Captain Cummins, and maybe Dr. Ahmad."

"Anyone else running for council?" Carol asks.

"Gunther. He's the assistant farm manager. Thomas. He's a deputy and a field medic. Deputies can be on the council, but the sheriff can't."

Carol knows that too, of course.

"So that's thirteen candidates for nine slots," Inola concludes. "Unless anyone else decides to run. So I guess I have a decent chance."

[*]

Later that night, when Carol's stripping off all her gear and laying it in a neat line on the dresser, Daryl, who's sitting down on the bed to unlace his boots, asks, "So ya don't want no one to know yer runnin'?"

"Not yet." She unbuckles her belt and drapes it over the wood chair in the corner, on top of Daryl's. "Not until we're full citizens, at least."

Daryl's boot goes flying off his foot and hits the opposite wall. He peels off his socks and tucks them in the other boot.

Carol drops her pants. "And I probably won't announce until June." She unbuttons her outer shirt and drapes it on the chair.

Daryl chews on his thumbnail, the way he does when he's nervous. He drops his hand. "I…uh….maybe already mentioned it to Mitch. When we was huntin' yesterday."

She sighs.

"I didn't know!" he says defensively. "Ya didn't tell me ya didn't want no one to know."

Carol pulls her bra out through her sleeves and hangs it over her shirt before crawling into bed in only her tank top and underwear. "Could you maybe ask him not to mention it?"

"Sure. Don't think he talks much to anyone anyhow, though." Daryl yanks off his shirt, stands, and drops his pants.

"You know…" she tells him when he turns down the oil lamp and crawls in naked "…we've _already_ had sex today."

"Ain't got no boxer's to sleep in, 'n 's warm."

"We could switch to the lighter blanket."

"Nah. 'M fine. 'N…ya know…if ya _happen_ to change yer mind….'m accessible."

She chuckles. "I'm tired." She settles her head on his shoulder. "Seven years ago, did you ever think you'd be comfortable sleeping completely naked with someone?"

"Nah. Really didn't."

She snuggles closer. "Well, I'm glad I make you comfortable."

He warps his arms around her. "Right now m'balls are kind of uncomfortable, though. Kind of blue."

"Stop. I did nothing to tease you."

"Took yer pants off."

"To sleep. In my plain cotton underwear."

"Wearin' that damn sexy tank top."

"It's just a regular tank top. Not even a nice one." It t has a thread loose on the bottom and a hole in one shoulder strap.

"Yeah, but 's got a really nice pair of tits 'neath it. Could see yer nipples through it."

"Well you can't see anything now," she tells him. "It's dark."

"Can imagine 'em, though." His voice grows huskier. "Getting hard when I flick my tongue all over 'em…" He runs a finger up her spine. "'N pinch 'n twist 'em just the way ya like…." He runs the finger back down. "Suck on 'em 'til ya squirm."

"Dammit."

He chuckles. "Horny now?"

"A little bit."

He rolls on his side to face her and snakes a hand beneath her shirt. "Bet I can make ya alotta bit."

"Maybe," she admits as he begins to caress her bare breasts. "But take it _slowly_ this time."

"Yes'm," he murmurs as he bends his head to kiss her.

Carol closes her eyes and lets the gentle pleasure of his hands and mouth wash over her.


	67. Chapter 67

Carol's knife slurps out of the walker's forehead. Black guts drip to the ground. Dante peels the creature off the pike while she cleans her blade. "I guess this is the last week we'll be working together," Dante says as he drags the body backward into the woods. He comes back dusting off his hands. "You're being deputized and working full-time for the sherriff's office starting next week, aren't you?"

"I am."

"I'll miss you," Dante tells her. "You're way better to work with than Arnie. But he'll be glad to be off outhouse duty." He checks the pike, and it holds and they walk on. "Were there any outdoor firepits left at that Home Depot?"

"A few."

"Can you get me one next time you're there? When the logs are dry, I'll help Daryl lay them for an hour if you do."

"Two hours," Carol tells him.

"You're _already_ going to be there," Dante reasons.

"But it's risky, and it's an all-day trip."

"Fine, two hours."

"I thought you already had a firepit?" She's patrolled past his hut before, the one he shares with two other men, including Inola's brother.

"I want to give it to Inola. She likes to sit out in front of her hut sometimes to watch the kids play in the evening. She won't need it _now_ , but it would be nice if she had one for next fall and winter."

"You really look out for her," Carol says.

"Well, I promised Atohi I would when he was dying. We really thought he was going to pull through from that gunshot wound, but…he didn't." Dante sighs and shakes his head. "Three people died in that battle. Only _three_ people. Why did it have to be _him_? He had a _wife_. He had someone to love and to love him. Why wasn't it some single guy like me, instead? You know, someone who wouldn't be missed?"

"I'm _sure_ you would have been missed," Carol tells him.

"Yeah, I mean, I have lots of friends. People seem to like me. But I don't have _family_. Atohi was the closest thing to family I've had since the Great Sickness killed off mine. He was like a brother to me."

"And is Inola like a sister to you?" Carol asks.

Dante's footsteps slow slightly. He seems to be thinking about that question. But then his pace picks up. "There's another cannibal up ahead. Pike looks broken. It's peeling itself off. Let me kill this one." He unsheathes his knife.

[*]

Twigs snap and brush crackles beneath the pounding feet of the two hunters as they chase the injured deer through the woods. Mitch, being thinner and faster pulls far ahead of Daryl and takes another shot, but the deer keeps fleeing because they keep missing the heart and head. With an arrow in its side and two bullets in its hide now, the deer runs on.

Panting, Daryl catches up to Mitch and slows to a walk. "'S just follow the trail. Gotta give out eventually."

Mitch shoulders his rifle and takes a swig from his canteen. "Let's just hope we get it before a cannibal does."

They walk on along the trail of blood, quietly for a while, and then Daryl says. "Uh…ya ain't told no one what I told you, have ya? 'Bout Carol maybe runnin' for Council?"

Mitch looks up from the trail at him. "Why?"

"Carol don't want it known yet."

"Oh."

"Ya tell someone?"

"Well…maybe."

"Shit," Daryl mutters. "'M gonna get in trouble now."

"I don't think he'll tell anyone. It was pillow talk. And he doesn't want anyone to know we're fucking, so…" Mitch shrugs. "He wants to stay deep in the closet."

"Who?" Daryl asks.

"I just told you he wants to stay deep in the closet."

"Ain't Dante is it?" Because then Dante would blab to Inola, who's running herself. And Inola would tell her brother…and it would just keep spreading from there.

" _Dante_?" Mitch laughs. "No, why would you think he was gay with all the flirting he does with women? Or is that _why_? You think it's a case of classic overcompensation?"

Daryl shrugs. "Wasn't thinkin' Just worried it was him."

"Well it's not. It's just some sailor, and I really don't think he'll mention it to anyone. Although I think you're right. Dante _is_ overcompensating. Just not for _that_."

"Hell's that mean?" Daryl asks, pausing to study the sign because the blood trail has temporarily petered out. He turns left and moves through the woods.

Mitch follows. "I think he's probably in love with Inola. But he'd never let himself make a move on her, because Atohi was his best friend."

Daryl steps over a fallen tree branch. "You the town gossip now?"

"You asked. And it's not gossip. It's not like he told me that. That's just my impression. There it is!" Mitch points through the trees. "Shit! Cannibal!"

Daryl shoots the walker lurching toward the fallen deer, which has given out in a clearing several yards away. The walker flops to the ground. Mitch is already running ahead and drawing his hunting knife, and when he arrives, he quickly puts the animal out of its misery.

Daryl does the field dressing as Mitch stands guard, and while he's digging out the organs, he says, "Congrats on yer new boyfriend."

"He doesn't want to be my boyfriend," Mitch replies forlornly. "He just wants to fuck. But it's better than nothing, I guess."

[*]

Gary crawls under the kitchen table to recover the piece of the 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle Garland dropped on the floor and hands it to him. "You put the last piece in," he tells his son.

Gary tries to, but he breaks apart the puzzle a bit as he does so, and Garland pieces it together and sticks the last piece in to make the African scene.

"Roar!" Gary yells.

"And now we have to take it all apart again. Get me the box, Gary."

Daryl, who's just finished putting away the dry dishes, which is his one and only domestic chore, because Carol doesn't trust him to do the washing, closes the door of the cabinet on the hutch and looks down at the puzzle. "Still can't believe ya put together jigsaw puzzles, man. 'S just…weird."

"Are you questioning my husband's manhood?" Shannon asks from the couch, and Carol, who is knitting in the rocking chair, snorts.

"Wouldn't dare," Daryl says. "'S a better shot with a rifle 'n me."

The pieces of the puzzle clatter into the open box as Daryl walks over to the armchair and slumps down in it. He watches Carol quietly for awhile and then asks, "Hell ya makin'?"

"A blanket for the baby. I know there's plenty in storage, but the little tyke should have something more personal."

"That's sweet," Shannon tells her. "He'll treasure his blanket from his Auntie Carol."

"It could be a girl, you know," Garland tells her as he brings the box back to the bookshelf and slides it on top of a row of books.

"If it is, she's going to have you wrapped around her little finger."

 **[*]**

Daryl and Inola finish laying the stone foundation of the cabin by the end of the week. Because he's busy with that, Carol decides to push off their planned return to Home Depot.

In a short ceremony in the courthouse chapel, the thirty former inhabitants of the Kingdom are granted full citizenship rights. "Raise your right hands," Mayor Barron tells them, "and repeat after me: I do solemnly swear to live in peace with my neighbors."

Voices rise in echoed chorus.

"I swear to defend my community as necessary against human enemies and cannibals," the oath continues. "I swear to honor the charter of New Jamestown, to obey its laws, and to work honestly for the enrichment of the community."

When the oath is complete, the mayor says, "I now pronounce you full citizens of New Jamestown."

When the citizenship ceremony is done, Sheriff Earl Carter says, "I have new deputy to swear in. Carol, would you come forward?"

Carol walks up to the altar and repeats the oath that Sheriff Earl feeds her line by line. Then he pins a gold star to her shirt. As she and Daryl file out of the chapel later, he smirks and says, "Never thought I'd be married to a _cop_. Wonder what Merle would say?"

 **[*]**

"Hey, what are you doing here?" Carol asks when Daryl sits down next to her in one of the folding chairs at the open town hall meeting. Carol just came to watch, as usual.

"Gotta get approval for some shit in storage," he whispers.

When Daryl's called upon by the council, he stands and says, "Wanna mattress from storage. How 'bout I bring back a wood stove from Home Depot and trade it for the matress? Someone's gonna need a stove 'ventually. Fair trade, right?"

"I motion we allow it," Garland says.

"I second the motion," Dr. Ahmad says.

"All in favor?" Garland asks. All nine hands go up. "Anything else?"

"Yeah. See ya got some flat wood in storage. Want it for the floor in m'cabin. How 'bout 'nother wood stove 'n an outdoor fire pit for the wood?"

"Oh no!" Shannon yells.

"Ain't that unreasonable!" Daryl insists. "Could throw in some – "

"- No, I mean," Shannon pushes back her chair and stands up. "I think my water just broke."

Garland stands abruptly and his chair topples over. He puts a hand on his wife's arm and looks down at the water dripping from beneath her maternity dress. "It can't break. You aren't due for four to six weeks."

"Well try tellin' that to the baby, baby! I don't think it cares about your time table."

Dr. Ahmad has risen now. "Carol, can you run for the midwife? She lives in the old governor's mansion? Send her to the infirmary. We'll be there. It's the nearest place to deliver the baby, and the best one if it turns out to need assistance."

"Of course." Carol rushes off toward the settlement.

When she gets back with the midwife, Daryl stands at the end of the hallway to the offices with his back to the wall, chewing on his thumbnail. Shannon's screams drift down the hallway. The midwife hurries inside, and the door shuts behind her.

Carol leans back next to Daryl. He winces at Shannon's next scream.

"Those contractions must be coming hard and fast," Carol says. "She must have been having them for hours and not even realized it. She was complaining of being _uncomfortable_ this morning."

"Preschool lets out 'n twenty minutes," Daryl tells her. "Garland wants us to pick up Gary. Feed 'em dinner. Watch 'em 'til…" He nods down the hallway.

"Then let's go get him."

As they walk back, Daryl asks nervously, "'S six weeks really premature? It gonna survive?"

"Sophia was born exactly five weeks early. The doctor said one more day and she would have been considered premature. She was small, only six pounds, and she slept for most of the next three weeks. I had to force her to wake up and eat, but she was fine. Besides, the doctor isn't certain how far along Shannon is. The baby could be only four weeks early. She was looking pretty big. I bet that baby will be at least six and half pounds."

Ivan Daryl Barron, it turns out, weighs in at precisely seven pounds. He's eighteen inches long and has a fine fuzz of reddish-brown hair on his head and a splatter of freckles across his nose. His eyes are a pale blue, but their final color may turn out to be different. Dr. Ahmad holds him and Shannon in the infirmary overnight for observation, but the next morning the parents and baby arrive at the cabin while Daryl, Carol, and Gary are eating breakfast.

Garland flings open the cabin door and rolls his exhausted wife in in a wheelchair, with the baby cradled in her arms.

Little Gary gasps, drops his spoon in his oatmeal, and jumps down from his chair. "I'm a big bwother! I'm a big bwother!" He runs to see the baby, and Daryl and Carol, smiling, follow.

 **[*]**

The baby is baptized three days later in a ceremony in the chapel, and Carol and Daryl are asked to stand in as godparents. It's the first time Daryl's attended a church service since his mother's funeral, and he's uncomfortable the entire time, but he's proud to be named the godfather.

He takes to calling the baby VanDaryl, and after a few days, the rest of the household relents and starts using the name, too.


	68. Chapter 68

Daryl sighs and flings his arm across his forehead in bed. "Jesus," he mutters. "Does it ever stop? Don't 'member Little Ass Kicker cryin' this damn much."

Shannon paces outside the closed bedroom doors with the crying baby. For the last three nights, she's been sleeping on the couch, with the cradle in the living room, to allow Garland and Gary a chance to sleep. Garland's begun working for Shannon's rations so she can take time off, and between his work as mayor and the many hours of labor he puts in for both of them and Gary, he comes home exhausted and sleeps like a rock. Gary sleeps with orange shooter's earplugs rolled in his ears.

"I think he has colic," Carol says. "Sophia did. I used to run the vacuum cleaner. It was the only thing that would soothe her. But we don't have electricity or a vacuum cleaner."

Daryl flings the sheet off himself and yanks on his pants and then his muscle shirt.

"Where are you going?" Carol asks.

"Can do that. Can sound like a vacuum cleaner."

Carol, curious, follows him out the door in her tank top and athletic shirt to watch him take the baby from Shannon, who, exhausted and mystified, allows him.

"Shhhhhh!" Daryl soothes in a low hum as he cradles the tiny creature gently in his arms. "VanDaryl," he coos, "Hey. Listen!"

The baby suddenly stops crying and turns its head and open eyes in the direction of the sound of Daryl's voice as he begins to hum like a vacuum cleaner. It's not a bad approximation. Daryl walks back and forth in front of the fireplace, humming to the baby, who continues to looks up at him. Carol's not sure how far a baby can see at just a few days old, but VanDaryl's eyes follow the voice. Dog looks up, too, from his spot by the empty fireplace, and whines jealously.

Shannon looks at Carol and smiles as Daryl strolls around the living room, humming to the baby. "He's closed his eyes," Daryl whispers after a couple of minutes.

"Oh thank heavens," Shannon sighs.

"Has he been fed?" Carol asks.

Shannon nods. "And changed. Walk with him a little more, Daryl, please. Make sure he's really asleep."

Daryl, resuming his humming, circles the living room. After another three minutes, he hands the tiny tyke over to Shannon, carefully and slowly. She holds her breath when she receives him, and, closes her eyes in relief when he doesn't awaken. Quietly, she returns him to the cradle.

 **[*]**

By the second week of May, the fields outside the settlement are littered with wildflowers. Some even claw their way up from the dirt inside the stone rectangle of the cabin's foundation. The brick hearth and chimney stand proudly in a cabin without walls or roof or floor. The logs still lay in piles drying. Carol stands and surveys the handiwork. "It's beautiful," she tells Daryl, and it is, a symmetrical, well-patterned hearth of red, black, and brown, with the mortar neatly smoothed between the bricks, and a well sanded mantle of dark wood. "I love it. I can't wait to sit in front of that fireplace in the evenings."

"Well, thank Inola. She did the pattern thing with the bricks. Just did whatever the hell she told me to."

"When can you start building the walls?"

"Mid-June."

"So you'll have a little break?"

"Mhmh. But 'm gonna do some more huntin' off the clock. Earn more shit to trade to – "

"- Take a few days off at least. Just do your twenty for a week. Let's go shopping again on your next day off. I promised Dante I'd pick up that firepit for Inola, and you want those two stoves to trade for the mattress and the wood for the floor."

He grins. "Can't _wait_ to take ya shoppin'."

" _Just_ shopping. No funny business against the model kitchen counters this time."

"Mhmm."

[*]

Carol honors her word. There's no funny business against the model kitchen counters this time. Instead, Carol rides Daryl hungrily on the porch swing in the garden section, while kneeling and straddling his lap. The swing shakes, and the chains squeak and clatter while their grunting and panting drifts to the ceiling of the glassed-in porch.

"We can't make a habit of that," she insists afterward when they're both standing and buckling their belts. "It's not safe. Someone could sneak up on us."

"Can't think of a better way to go, though."

She shakes her head.

They load up the rocking chair they left behind the first time, but Carol settles on a different table, one that wasn't on display, so she didn't notice it. It's in parts in a box, and it's the perfect size – a square big enough to fit four people, with neutral color tiles.

"Take up less room in the wagon, too," Daryl says.

They clear out the two remaining two wood stoves and three of the outdoor firepits. Carol picks up some curtains, because she's going to help Shannon redecorate "the boys' room" when she and Daryl move out. Once the baby is sleeping through the night, he'll share Gary's room, and Garland and Shannon will have their own again.

Daryl goes to gather a few more tools, and Carol finds him later in the lawn section, looking at the artificial turf. "Wanna lawn?" he asks.

She laughs. "No, Pookie. You don't need to be installing turf for me." It would look ridiculous to be the only cabin with a lawn in a settlement that nature has paved with barren earth.

"How 'bout as a floor? Inside the cabin? Could just roll that shit down. Wouldn't need no wood then. Be like walkin' barefoot in the grass all day."

Carol doesn't think it would feel anything like walking barefoot in the grass, and it would be hideously tacky to have turf for a _floor_. It's about the most redneck design suggestion she's ever heard. But she doesn't say any of that. She says, "I think you should stick to your original plan for the wood floor. That was a really good idea." She wiggles an eyebrow. "And you're very talented with wood." She bumps his shoulder playfully.

" _Stahp_."

"I know you secretly love my sex jokes," she teases him.

Daryl shakes his head. Once outside, he jigsaws the looted goods into the wagon until it's three-quarters full.

"You don't have to do it like you're playing tetris," Carol tells him. "There's plenty of room this time." It was the couch and arm chair that really filled the space last time.

"Wanna save room for later."

"Are we going shopping somewhere else?"

"Mhm. Wanna take a different route back. Be an extra hour, maybe. Check out the Target over here." He pulls out a map and shows her the route. "Garland told me 'bout it."

"Don't you think it's probably been well looted by now?"

"Of all the important shit, yeah. Garland said Jamestown cleaned it out of most stuff. But might get a few gifts for VanDaryl. 'N somethin' ya like for the cabin."

She smiles. "Okay. We made good time today. So let's go see what we can find for our godson."

[*]

In the parking lot of the Target, car doors stand open, gas caps hang loose, and trunks are popped and linger half way up. The dead bodies of walkers litter the asphalt. Daryl looks it all over and thinks they should have been more systematic in their own looting and storing at the start, instead of going on supply runs whenever goods ran low. Of course, they would have just lost it all when the quarry was overrun, when the farm burned, when the prison was destroyed. They never could seem to hold a camp for long, not in those first two years.

The naval men who founded Jamestown had, from the start, a clear plan to survive in a world that would never be the same. They didn't waste time waiting for the government to fix things, or roaming in search of some false hope in the CDC or Washington, D.C. They picked a logical, defensible spot with access to fertile land and a river, and then spent seven months clearing and securing it. They spent the next year, before the gas spoiled, looting and storing up.

With trucks and heavy firepower, they cleared out store after store and farm after farm. They rounded up loose cows, horse, goats, chickens, and pigs whenever they came across one that hadn't been feasted upon. They stockpiled guns, ammunition, and reloading supplies; seeds, fertilizer, and gardening tools; medical supplies; canned, dried, and powdered goods; boots and shoes, coats and jackets, and other clothes. They looted dog and cat food and all the cans of baby formula they could find, not because anyone was thinking of having babies or keeping pets, but because if times got rough, people could turn to such food. All that scavenging and storing up was what got such a large population through the first few years, through harsh winters and occasional drought, until the crops really took root and flourished and they established an efficient rotation system for the farming, until the animals bred and multiplied.

Carol and Daryl bring the horses in through the smashed sliding glass doors of the Target, tether them to the rails that coral the carts, and roll out barbwire across the door's opening, just in case. They set down pans of water. Lancelot and Guinevere lower their heads and sip.

"Clear left," Daryl tells Carol. "I'll go right. Up 'n down the aisles. Meet in the center aisle."

They do, but they find no walkers or people. Carol leaves her bow and arrows with the horses, but carries her rifle on her shoulder, as Daryl does his crossbow. She grabs the handle of a loose shopping cart, and after some initial effort at pushing, the wheels being rolling, kicking off the dust of years.

The racks of women's, men's, boys', and girls' clothing have been entirely cleared out. In the shoe section, only baby shoes and a handful of size 5, 6, and 7 toddler shoes remain. Carol takes all six remaining pairs of boys' toddler shoes and throws them in the cart. Then she selects from among the baby shoes a tiny pair of cowboy boots, spotted black and white like a cow.

Daryl huffs. "Hell's a _baby_ need boots for? Can't walk!"

"They're adorable!" Carol insists. "And Garland will love them. They're a bit like his."

"His're made from _real_ cow."

They leave the shoe section and walk over to where the "Baby" sign dangles, with a bullet hole through the bottom loop of the B. There are no formula or diapers, but Carol snags a manual breast pump for Shannon, three packages of pacifiers – the only three left - two packages of tiny socks, and three packages of Gerber onesies. She also grabs some teething rings and throws them in the cart. Daryl picks out a rubber duck that squeaks and a set of colorful, plastic keys. Carol selects a _Deluxe Healthcare and Grooming Kit_ , complete with soft brush, comb, safety nail clippers, thermometer, toothbrush, and suction nose bulb.

Daryl points to the nose bulb. "Hell's that for?"

"Suctioning snot out of the baby's nose when it gets a cold."

"Gross."

She laughs. "Says the man who regularly guts animals." She heads over to the baby and toddler clothes racks, which unlike the older kids' sections still have some clothes dangling from them. Carol holds up a 4T shirt that says _Big Brother_. "We're getting this for Gary. We should get him some toys, too. I think he's been feeling a little left out lately."

"Pffft."

"What? It's true. You're just scoffing because _you_ were the little brother." She folds the t-shirt and tosses it in their shopping cart. "Have you noticed you've stopped playing so many games with Gary?"

"What? No I ain't."

"He asked you last night and you said, no, VanDaryl might wake up if you stopped rocking him."

"Well he might of!" Daryl grumbles.

"I'm just saying. It's not always easy being the older sibling."

"A'ight. I hear ya. Headin' to the toy aisle." He wanders off while Carol continues to look at the baby clothes. He finds the toy section and rips apart the packaging on a Nerf gun and loads it up.

Daryl creeps his way silently back to the baby aisle, cautiously rounds the shelving, and blasts Carol where she stands sorting through shirts on a rack. The foam darts hit her ass one after the other, bouncing off her blue jeans and scattering onto the floor.

Carol has her handgun out of her holster and has whirled around before she realizes what's going on. She curses and slides the gun back in the holster with a click. "Dammnit, Daryl! I could have killed you!"

"Nah. Yer smart 'nuff to look at what yer shootin' for ya pull the trigger." He pops off one more shot. The foam dart hits her forehead and falls to the floor, and he snickers at her glower.

"Well now you're just asking for it," she says, and bolts to the left.

Daryl stands puzzled for a moment before he realizes she's running for a Nerf gun of her own. He tries to cut her off in the toy aisle, but she's already snagged something and disappeared somewhere to rip it out of the packaging and load up. He grabs another pack of ammo and rips it open with his teeth and frantically reloads his nerf gun. He's just gotten the last bullet in when something hits his ass. He whirls around and opens fire on Carol, who shoots back with little foam-tipped arrows.

Daryl takes off running and rounds the shelf to come at her from behind, but she rounds it too in the other direction. A barrage of bullets and arrows fly through the Barbie section. When they're both empty, he finally gets a good look at what she's holding.

"They got a Nerf _crossbow_?" he asks. "I didn't see that! I want that!"

"It's mine!" she tells him, and takes off running back down the Nerf aisle, where she grabs another package of arrows and keeps running. He drops his Nerf gun and runs after her through the store, sliding across the tile floor as he rounds another corner. He finally catches up with her in the furniture section, where he grabs at her from behind and they both go plummeting down into a big bean bag chair.

Daryl lands on his real crossbow. "Ow." He sits half up, slides it off his shoulder, and leaves it on the floor. Then he grabs at her toy crossbow. "Gimme."

She relents, unshoulders her rifle, and rests it on the floor next to the beanbag chair.

Lying on his back with his head and torso on the chair but his ass on the floor, Daryl surveys the toy weapon. "Oh yea! Gary's gettin' this one."

Carol lays down next to him and finishes catching her breath from all the running. After they've rested for a couple of minutes, Daryl sets the toy aside. He rolls toward her and puts a hand on her hip before kissing her lips, her cheek, and then her ear, where he murmurs, "This'd be a good place to fuck."

"No."

"C'mon."

" _No_. I told you that's not happening again. Certainly not twice in one day."

"How 'bout a quick blow job then? Bean bag chair's soft for kneelin'."

Carol laughs. "Clearly I spoil you much too much." She kisses his forehead and gets to her feet. He sighs and rises to his feet as well, and that's when they hear the horses neighing frantically.

"Shit!" Daryl snatches his crossbow from off the floor and runs for the front door.

A walker is stretching the barbwire inward from the open doorframe as it tries to get toward the horses. The wire tears at its already shredded clothes and decaying flesh. Lancelot has reared up and is kicking his front hooves.

Daryl shoots the walker while Carol soothes the horses. As the walker slumps down, the barbwire rips off from where it was tied on one side of the door. Daryl goes out into the parking lot to survey for more, but finds nothing. The walker is well decayed and has few remaining strips of clothing clinging to its rotting body, so Daryl doesn't bother to search it for ammo. He reties the wire.

"A'ight," he tells Carol. "We won't fuck. But 's finish the shoppin'."

By the time they leave, they have lots of clothes for the baby, Nerf toys and board games for Gary, three jigsaw puzzles for Garland, the bean bag chair for Daryl, and a two-door, cherry oak accent cabinet (disassembled in the box) for Carol. She thinks it will look good in the cabin after she puts it together, and she can use it to store the dishes and glasses she took from the kitchen aisle. They also take a great deal of fabric, thread, yarn, buttons, hooks, zippers, and needles from the sewing section, because Jamestown seems to have overlooked most of those. They were too busy looting manufactured clothes, perhaps, to worry about making their own.

Since all this scavenging is off-the-clock, all the loot is _theirs_. They now have a lot of goods to trade for other goods already in the Jamestown storehouse. Daryl will trade for his mattress and wood flooring. They'll get new sheets and blankets and maybe even a few batteries.

Carol volunteers to drive home, and they begin to make their way across the target parking lot, horse hooves clattering on the asphalt, and the heavy wagon creaking behind them.


	69. Chapter 69

The next week, Shannon uses the manual breast pump Carol picked up from Target to express a bottle of milk and leaves it in a cooler with Daryl and Carol so Garland can take her to The Tavern for a Mother's Day dinner. She feeds the baby right before they leave, but the bottle's "just in case."

"Stay out as long as you two want," Carol assures her. "You deserve a break."

"I'm not sure I have the energy to stay out late," Shannon admits.

"Then I'll tell you what. Daryl and I will keep the cradle in _our_ bedroom tonight, and we'll hold onto the bottle for the night feeding so that you two can get some rest."

"Think Gary could sleep in your room, too?" Garland asks.

"Baby, it's not like you're getting sex," Shannon tells him. "Six weeks, remember? It's only been three."

Garland flushes. "Still," he murmurs beneath his breath, "a little rest, a little cuddling, a little privacy maybe for…" He whispers something in her ear, and Shannon chuckles.

"Hey, Buddy," Daryl says to Gary, "Wanna build a fort in m'room tonight? Sleep in it on the floor?"

"Yeah! Bwanket fowt! Big Big bwanket fowt!"

Garland nods a _thank you_ toward Daryl, and Daryl returns a _Got yer back, man_ nod.

About an hour later, Carol is rocking with the baby before the fire in the living room when she hears loud clattering from the bedroom. She goes to check on the boys with VanDaryl cradled in her arms. She finds both twin beds pushed all the way against the window and blankets stretched from one end of one bed and up to the top of the tall dresser, pinned down by hardback books, and then more blankets stretched from the dresser to a chair that's been moved to the far corner.

Daryl and Gary are on their stomachs under the peaks of the blanket fort, with the oil lamp resting on the floor to light the area now that the sun has set. They're playing Hungry Hippos, which Daryl picked up for Gary at Target. The little boy slaps his lever loudly and the marbles roll across the board. Daryl's hippo snags the very last one.

"You know what," she says, "I think I'll sleep on the couch tonight. The baby's used to being in his cradle in the living room. You boys can sleep in your fort."

"Ghost stowies!" Gary exclaims.

"Yeah," Daryl agrees. "Tell ya some good ghost stories."

"Well don't _scare_ him," Carol insists.

Daryl rolls his eyes knowingly at Gary, and Gary laughs.

Carol returns to the living room and rocks with VanDaryl in the rocking chair. The baby roots for her breast, not because he's hungry, she doesn't think, but for comfort. She gives him her finger instead, and he begins to suck, his soft blue eyes staring up at her face, and affection and sadness flood her heart all at once, joy in this new life and the new future that stretches before her, grief at the old losses behind her.

By the time Garland and Shannon come home, talking and laughing, the baby is asleep. They fall silent when they see their son in the cradle. Carol whispers to them that she hasn't used the bottle yet and that they should have a night to themselves, at least until the early morning feeding. They disappear into their bedroom while Carol makes her bed on the couch.

Carol is dead asleep when VanDaryl starts crying an hour and a half later. She rises slowly to consciousness, at which time the baby abruptly stops crying. She realizes why when she sees Daryl's shadowy form plucking VanDaryl from his cradle. Daryl settles in the rocking chair and says, "I'll feed 'em. Go back ta sleep."

She starts to, but the baby fusses. In the low light of the fire, she can make out Daryl's frustrated expression. "He won't take the bottle."

"Did you warm it up?"

"Hell would I warm it up for?"

"Well, it was in a cooler. Breast milk is a warmer temperature. That's probably why he won't take it." Carol takes the bottle from him. "I'll warm it up. Give him the pacifier in the meantime."

Daryl slips the pacifier into the baby's mouth. "Little Ass Kicker always took it cold. Or room temperature. Or any damn way ya gave it to her."

"She did. That's true. But most babies don't like it cold."

"She was tough," Daryl says. "Still is."

"Mhmhm…" Carol agrees while she lights the wood stove and fills a pan with water.

"Hope VanDaryl ain't a sissy."

" _Daryl_ ," she scolds.

"Mean, he's got m'name."

"He has your _influence_ , too. And Garland's. He might not turn out to be a hunter or a warrior or a leader. He may have his own separate amazing gifts. But he'll never be a _coward_. So don't ever think that if he takes a different path."

Daryl pushes off the floor and looks down at the baby. "Hey, VanDaryl," he whispers. "Wanna be a hunter, don't ya?" He looks across the living room to the kitchen. "Nah. He says he wants to be a hunter."

Carol chuckles and shakes her head.

"Gonna be a crossbow man, ain't ya, Van man?" The baby opens his mouth and stares up at Daryl. The pacifier falls out. His little freckled face scrunches up, and VanDaryl cries. Daryl plops the pacifier back in his mouth. "Well, might be a rifle man like his daddy. That'd be a'ight."

"What if he's an artist or a musician?" Carol asks.

"This world got dead people and livin' monsters walkin' 'round. Don't need no damn artists and musicians."

Carol sets the bottle in a pan of water. "I don't know. Maybe that's what this world needs most of all."

 **[*]**

Carol's gold star twinkles in the firelight from the torches that line the path between the huts and to the tavern. She'll snuff them all out shortly after ten o'clock, when the tavern closes, quiet hours begin, and people are expected to be inside their huts. Then she'll walk home by the light of the oil lamp she now carries in her right hand. But her left hand is wrapped around the upper arm of a man she's dragging back to the tavern to pay the tab he skipped out on.

Sheriff Earl was right to make her wait until she had the authority of a deputy to take on night patrol. She already had to break up a drunken brawl just outside the tavern, and that was before sunset. Neither man wanted to press charges against the other, so she gave them both a citation for drunk and disorderly and sent them home to their separate huts. She'll have to check the files tomorrow to see if it's a first offense for both, as they claim it is. If it is, the citation will suffice. If it's not, there will be fines assessed.

The man she's dragging now is a farmer who goes by the name of Timmy Two Toes, apparently because he lost two toes to a badly aimed gunshot during the raid Shannon's old camp made a little over three years ago. But that's not what's making him stumble. It's the moonshine he hasn't paid for.

"When'd the sheriff start hiring such sexy deputies?" asks Timmy, leering down her shirt.

"You realize I can charge you with harassing an officer of the law?"

"Oh, you like putting a man in handcuffs, do you? I like to play, too, sweetheart."

Carol rolls her eyes and shoves him into the tavern, a little too hard, because he trips and falls on his face. "Get up and pay your bill," she says, which he does, after picking himself up and glaring at her furiously. He staggers his way to the bar and pulls out a roll of tobacco from his pocket.

"That enough?" Timmy Two Toes asks.

Madam Linda weighs it on a little scale on the bar and says, grudgingly, "Just _barely_."

Another man shoots back the last of the moonshine in front of him and slides off his stool. He has salt-and-pepper hair, and looks at Carol with deep brown eyes. A jagged scar runs across his cheek, through a fine fuzz of black-and-gray stubble. "I'll get Tommy back to his bed in the barracks, deputy," he says. "That's where I'm headed anyway." He holds out his hand to Carol. "I'm Gunther Hamilton. I don't think we've ever formally met."

"Carol Dixon," she says and shakes.

"Yes, I know who you are."

She recognizes his name, too. "You're the assistant farm manager?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"You're running for council, I hear?"

"That I am. But please don't hold my roommate's behavior against me when it's time to vote."

"That would be extremely unfair of me if I did," she replies. "You have seventeen roommates, don't you?" Those barracks are full, many of the beds occupied by men from the former Kingdom.

"Yes. Someday I may build myself a cabin like I've seen your husband doing, if I'm every lucky enough to have a wife. But that seems highly unlikely."

"Well," Carol tells him. "Who knows. One day we might establish a trading route to one of the camps of the alliance I come from." If this man gets elected to the council, she wants his vote in favor of establishing that trade route. "We could go as often as three times a year, if the council approves."

"I _have_ heard rumors there are three camps still standing in your alliance, and that one is an island full of women. Is that true?"

"Well, men live there, too. Including my son Henry." Henry's not quite a man yet, but he might as well be. He's seventeen now, and getting married, she suspects, at the fair in November, after turning eighteen. "But there are a lot of women."

"Damn!" Timmy Two Toes shouts. He's holding himself up against the bar. "What's a man got to do to get selected for that trade team! Because I could fuck me some Amazons!"

"Sorry, ma'am," Gunther apologizes as he grabs hold of the drunk man. He wraps an arm around him and helps him from the tavern.

Carol leaves the tavern after talking to Madam Linda for a moment and makes another pass between the huts. Inola sits outside her hut in a lawn chair by the fire pit Dante gave her in exchange for his promise of two hours of work once Daryl starts laying the logs. She's weaving a blanket, and Dante sits in a lawn chair next to hers, smoking. "Evening, Carol," he says. "Busy night?"

Carol pauses. "Friday nights always are, I hear."

"That's why I wouldn't go to the tavern," Inola tells her. "Even though Gunther invited me."

"It's just as well. Gunther isn't good enough for you," Dante insists.

"You don't think _anyone_ is good enough for me."

"Atohi was." Dante blows out a stream of smoke. " _Almost_."

Inola chuckles. "Gunther's too old for me. Lieutenant James is too young. Deputy Andrew is too lecherous. Councilman Marcus is too poor a kisser. You don't like _anyone_ who asks me out."

"You said that thing about Marcus," Dante replies. "Not _me_."

"You should quit smoking, you know. You'd be richer."

"But if everyone quit smoking, tobacco wouldn't be worth anything," Dante reasons.

"I didn't say _everyone_ should quit. Just _you_." Inola smiles as she weaves string around her free-standing loom. "Then _you'd_ have the money to invite me out." She peers at Dante over her loom and he seems suddenly startled. He looks away, at a woman who is dumping her washing water out near a French drain. The smoke of his cigarette curls in a gray cloud on the night air.

"What's the blanket for?" Carol asks to break the awkward silence.

"It's just a hobby now," Inola answers, "although I used to make a lot of money selling them in the old world. But no one wants to buy blankets now, not with so many in storage. It was a novelty back then, a handmade blanket by a Cherokee woman. I almost made more from that than I did from my job as a mason."

"It's beautiful," Carol tells her. "That would look great on the couch I picked out for our cabin. Three rounds of ammo?"

"Are you serious?" Inola asks.

"Is that not enough?" Carol asks. "I could give you four."

"I was just going to hang it with the others anyway."

"That's not how you bargain!" says Dante, looking back finally. "Tell her you can only part with it for five!"

Inola laughs. "But that's not true!"

"This is why you need a campaign manager," Dante teases. "You're much too honest. How are you ever going to get elected?"

"I'll happily sell it for three rounds when I'm finished," Inola tells Carol. She smiles at Dante. "And then maybe I'll take _you_ for a pint. I owe you one, don't I?"

"You don't owe me anything." Dante takes another puff and looks away again.

Carol nods to them and patrols on.

 **[*]**

Daryl holds their bottle of anniversary champagne in one hand as he leads Carol from the Barron's cabin. "Are we going to the Tavern?" she asks. He hunted twice his twenty hours this past week, to earn extra ammo, tobacco, and coffee beans, so he's got money burning a hole in his pocket. She figures they'll have full dinners at the Tavern tonight and split the champagne, and he'll leave a big tip.

"Nah, not the Tavern."

"Then _where_?"

"Y'll see."


	70. Chapter 70

Daryl leads Carol all the way to the docks. "Are we going to the movies?" Carol asks. The theater is in the museum beyond the docks, and they're showing _Romancing the Stone_ tonight, but she can't imagine Daryl willingly suffering through a romantic comedy. She thinks it's sweet that he planned a surprise at all, but she'd much rather eat at the tavern, where they can talk, than sit silently in a movie theater. And what are they going to do, pass the open bottle of champagne while they watch?

"Ain't goin' to the movies."

Now she's _really_ curious. He leads her to the end of the dock, where the _Susan Constant_ is anchored. Daryl waves Carol up the ramp and then pulls it up behind her. There's a two-person table on the deck, draped in a white tablecloth. A black, iron candelabra stands to the right of the table, adorned with unlit white taper candles, and in the center of the table rests a mason jar bursting with a small bouquet of yellow wildflowers. Daryl drives their anniversary champagne into the ice in a tin bucket beside the mason jar. The table has been set with china plates, silverware, and crystal wine and water glasses. On the deck sits a soft cooler, the kind for storing hot food. Carol's eyes twinkle with excitement. "Are we having a _dinner cruise_?"

"Somethin' like that."

She hears the clatter of bootsteps and turns to see Captain David Cummings, Lieutenant James Witherspoon, and three sailors rounding the ship. "We'll disappear below deck once we get you anchored up river," the captain tells them. "Just holler when you're ready to sail back." He takes the wheel of the ship and one sailor pulls up anchor while the others begin to raise the sails. It's a small crew, but enough to sail them a short ways from the dock.

Daryl takes her hand and tugs her to the ship's rail to watch as the _Susan Constant_ sails down river. They past the _Godspeed_ and the _Discovery_. They sail beyond the light house, where Sarah stands guard, past the last farm field, and through the rolled back chainlink river gate. A late spring breeze cools the humid air and rifles Carol's hair as the sails expand to catch the wind. Birds dip and spin and dive to catch bugs on the surface of the water, and then fly off again over the trees rising green and proud from a small rocky island in the midst of the river.

They drop anchor in the deep waters, a mile from Jamestown, in a spot with an excellent view of the setting sun. As Carol and Daryl stand watching the great orange orb sink below the distant island trees, Daryl with his arm around her waist, the captain and most of his crew retreat below deck. One sailor lingers to put food on the table behind them, fill the water glasses, and light the tapers in the candelabra.

"What did you have to pay them to do all this?" Carol whispers.

"'S m'business," Daryl replies. "Watch the damn sunset. Paid extra for this sunset."

She chuckles and rests her head on his shoulder. The rays of the sun flicker off the rippling blue-black waters, painting the canvas of the river. When the sun has sunk below the horizon, and the deck is lit only by the oil lamps at the bow and stern of the ship and by the expansive candelabra, Daryl tells her to have a seat at the table.

"I can't believe you did all this," she says as she surveys her steak, collard greens, and baked potato. The potato is cut part-way open, heaped with butter, sprinkled with salt and butter, and topped with green chives.

"Wasn't my idea," Daryl admits in a grumble. "Told Garland I was gonna take ya to the tavern, 'n he said I oughtta do somethin' more private 'n special for our first anniversary. 'S all his idea."

Carol smiles at his honesty. She doesn't think another man would admit that. "But _you_ executed it," she insists. "And you worked hard to pay for it. And I _love_ all this. Thank you."

He points to the wildflowers in the mason jar. "Picked those m'self, though. Garland didn't pick 'em."

"Yellow is my favorite color."

"Yeah." He smiles and ducks his head with humble-pride. "Know."

"You did good." Carol picks up her fork and points to the meat, which must be at least nine ounces, instead of the usual five the tavern serves when it has bear or venison. "I haven't had _cow_ since before it all started."

"One of 'em stopped givin' 'nuff milk. Butchered it two days ago. Sellin' the best cuts in the tavern. Garland says the rest'll go in rations next week, ground up, half pound per adult. He wants to grill burgers."

Carol knows how much this meal costs. She was on patrol yesterday and saw the price printed on the blackboard in the tavern. This one plate alone costs the same amount as two bowls of soup _and_ two pints of beer. She'd balk at the price if she didn't suspect that, in addition to working extra hours last week, Daryl had also done a little scavenging in houses and found some ammunition.

They let the champagne chill while they eat and talk. Carol would rather not drink on an empty stomach. It's been a couple weeks since she had any alcohol. The steak is heavenly. "I forgot how good this was," she admits. "I've gotten so used to wild game." She cuts into her potato and hums when she eats a bite.

"'N the collard are cooked in bacon grease." He shovels a bite of greens into his mouth and "Mhmmmmmms."

"This ship isn't very big," she notes. "If the council agrees to go to Oceanside, I don't think they'll be able to take more than ten people and us, will they?"

"Was talkin' to the cap'n earlier. Says if we go, we'd take the _Godspeed_. 'S bigger. Says maybe nineteen people total for the trip. Us, him, crew of eight, 'n eight other lucky men. Though I dunno 'bout you on a ship with eighteen horny men."

"I see you included yourself in that number." She says with a wiggling eyebrow.

"Stahp."

"Well I do hope Captain Cummins is re-elected to the council. He's probably my biggest support for this idea, outside of Garland and Shannon, and Shannon's not running again. I suppose Garland will be mayor again, though."

"Dunno. He thinks the cap'n might beat 'em out."

"Really?"

Daryl nods and cuts another bite from his steak.

"And how does Garland feel about that?" Carol asks.

Daryl glances to the ladder that leads below deck and lowers his voice. "Thinks the cap'n ain't ready. Says he's a great cap'n, but he don't care 'nuff 'bout the day to day stuff that ain't got shit to do with sailin', fishin', 'n defendin'."

"That would be my assessment, too, based on what I've seen at the town halls."

"But Garland says he's popular 'n good lookin', and they'll have already had Garland leadin' 'em a full term plus the transition months…so he ain't gonna be surprised if he loses."

"Well Garland's quite good-looking, too."

Daryl narrows his eyes at her. Carol smiles over her water glass, sips, and sets it down. "It's just an objective statement of fact," she assures him.

"M votin' for Garland," he says. "Mean, less _yer_ runnin' for mayor."

"No. Just council. It's too soon to make a bid for mayor. I don't know enough about how things work yet, and even if I did, I'm not sure I'd _want_ the responsibility. You see how hard Garland works, and he only gets half rations for it."

Garland hasn't been around as much since Shannon had the baby. In addition to his work as the mayor, he works another ten hours for the rest of his rations, twenty for Shannon's rations, and ten for Gary's. Shannon's told Carol she feels like they're _ships passing in the night_. That Mother's Day dinner was the first alone time the couple had together since the baby was born, and they haven't had any since.

"The mayor should get full adult rations just for being the mayor," she says. "That's more than twenty hours of work already."

Daryl glances at the ladder leading below deck again and then glances back. "'S what Garland thinks. He don't want to propose it, though. Thinks it'll make 'em look greedy. Thinks the cap'n'll use it against him, say _he_ wouldn't never ask for full rations if _he_ was mayor. But they cap'n ain't got no wife or kids neither, and he found all that ammo."

"Well, maybe I'll propose it if I'm elected to the council." She savors another bite. "And I bet he will have a wife before long."

"Sarah?" Daryl asks.

Carol nods. She savors another bite. "This is the best meal I've had since…I don't know when."

They're quiet for a while. The candlelight flickers across the table cloth and the stars twinkle above as the water gently laps against the hull.

"Thought 'bout a violinist," Daryl says. "Ya know, like in the cartoons, at fancy restaurants, 's always some violinist playin' at the table. Guess it's romantic 'n shit?"

"Some people think so."

"But he wanted four rounds 'n hour."

"I think I prefer having the privacy to talk, anyway." She lays down her fork because her plate is now clear. "Should we open the champagne?"

Daryl does, and it pops loudly. A gray-white wisp of mist curls out the top, and he fills each of the crystal champagne flutes. "Hope 's still good."

"It still bubbles." In fact, the bubbles are almost bubbling out. She slides her champagne flute toward herself.

Daryl puts the bottle back in the bucket, and raises his glass to sip.

"Wait! We need to toast our anniversary."

"Oh. Sorry."

"To us," says Carol, raising her glass toward him. "To a successful first year of married life."

"Successful?" he asks. "We lost the whole damn Kingdom."

"But not our marriage. And that matters to me more than the Kingdom."

Daryl's glass wavers slightly in his hand. "To m'wfie," he agrees. "Best damn wife in the whole damn world."

She smiles and they clink glasses before sipping.

"Still good!" she declares. As she sips, she says, "Since we've been gossiping about the Captain and politics…I think Inola likes Dante."

"Nah. 'S the other way round. Mitch says he's in love with 'er."

"Really? When I was patrolling the other night, I think she was hinting she wanted him to ask her out, but he just ignored the hint for some reason."

"'Cause she was married to his best friend."

"But he's dead." Carol takes a small sip. The liquid tingles on her tongue.

"So? Rick's dead 'n I'd ever get with 'Chonne."

"Well, I'd hope you wouldn't _get with_ Michonne because you're _married_. To me."

"Yeah, but mean, if'n I weren't. Still wouldn't. Out of respect for Rick."

"Is that the _only_ reason you didn't make a move on her when I was married to Ezekiel?" Carol asks, even though she doesn't really want to know the answer. "Even though you made a move on those other women?"

"Didn't really move on them women. They Just took 'em up on it. And I ain't 'Chonne's type."

"Is she _your_ type?"

Daryl sets his glass down on the table warily. "Don't have a type. 'Cept you."

"Do you think she's attractive?"

"Can we not do this on our anniversary? 'Cause I feel like 'm walkin' into a trap here and there ain't shit I can say that'll be right."

Carol sighs. "I'm sorry. Maybe I'm a little insecure about all those women you…" She trails off.

"'S just tryin' to kill the pain, Carol. Didn't work. Yer the one got _married_." He says that with a bitterness she didn't realize he stil lfelt. "'S easier to compete with a few one-time fucks than with the ghost of a royal husband, ain't it?"

Carol runs her finger around the circle at the stem of her glass. "I thought we weren't going to do this on our anniversary?"

"Ya started it."

She sighs. "You want me to say I'm sorry I married Ezekiel."

"And ya want me to say 'm sorry I fucked those women."

"Are you?"

"Yeah. But ya ain't sorry ya married 'Zeke."

She looks up from her glass and into his eyes. "I'm sorry we wasted so many years. But I don't know if I was whole enough to be yours back then."

"Didn't have to be whole." He grits his teeth for a moment, biting down on some emotion. Carol thinks it could be anger, or it could be hurt. It could be both. He chokes out, "I'd of taken ya in a million little pieces."

The crack in his voice twists her heart and waters her eyes. "You never _said_ so."

"How could ya not _know_?"

Carol uses two fingers to clear the mist in her eyes. "Because when Rick banished me, you didn't come looking."

"Wasn't no _time_ to come lookin'!"

It's as if the rug under which they've swept everything has come flying off the floor.

"You weren't _planning_ to," she says. "You were planning to go along with Rick's decision, even if you didn't like it. Weren't you?"

Daryl doesn't answer, but at least his honest silence hurts far less than a cheap excuse or outright lie would.

Carol lets out an unsteady sigh. "Then everything happened. The prison was lost. Terminus. The road. Alexandria. The Wolves. I loved you all. I loved you, but I never…I never felt a part of that family again. Not _really_. So I guess I felt like I had to find another family."

Daryl swallows. He drains his flute of champagne and sets it empty on the table.

"But it never felt fully… _real_." Carol admits. "My marriage to Ezekiel. It always felt like I was a little girl playing princess, playing house. I _love_ Henry. And Ezekiel was good to me. I needed the fantasy, I suppose. Needed it to heal. But it never felt _real_. This, _us_ …" She waves her hand from herself to him and back. "It feels _real_."

Daryl bites down on his bottom lip and nods. "Yeah," he manages. "'Cause it is."

"If we could go back in time, I know there's a dozen things we would both change. On the farm and in the prison, we healed each other, and we strengthened each other, but then the world gave us new wounds. We grew apart, and we hurt each other in our hurt. But then we came together again, closer than ever before, like we were always meant to be. And maybe we needed this place to do that. Maybe we _needed_ Jamestown. A new life. Away from our old families. Away from all the ghosts. Like the Bible says – leave and cleave."

Daryl's chair scrapes on the wooden planks of the deck as he scoots it back. "C'mere."

Carol leaves her mostly empty champagne flute, walks over, and sits on his lap with her arms around his neck. He wraps his arms around her waist and kisses her tenderly before pressing his forehead to hers and breathing in slowly. He lets out the breath like a grateful sigh. "Love ya, Carol. M'wife. Love ya so goddamn much."

She caresses his ear with the fingers of one hand and kisses his forehead softly before sliding off his lap and tugging him by the hand. "Let's look at the stars."

He stands, refills their flutes, and hands her one. They go to the rail and look out over the water at the stars above the trees on the little rocky island. With an arm draped around her shoulders, Daryl raises his flute to point out some of the constellations to her. He sips between constellations, and she sips as she listens to his explanations.

"How do you know all those?" she asks when he's done. "Who taught you? Merle?"

"Nah. Old widowed neighbor lady. Used to hang out on 'er back porch at night sometimes when m'folks were fightin'. She'd give me Coke. Teach me 'bout the stars. Knew all the stories behind 'em, too. Knew all the legends behind every damn thing. Flowers, too. She's the one told me 'bout the Cherokee rose."

"See, that's a little something I never knew about you." Carol settles her head back against his shoulder. "This is beautiful. I couldn't ask for a better anniversary."

"Even though we fought?"

"Especially because we fought."

Daryl scoffs.

"I'm serious. We can't be afraid to fight. The fact that we can fight, sweep out all that dirt into the light of day, and then still love each other…" She nods. "That's beautiful, too."

He bends his head to kiss her, and she sucks the lingering champagne off his tongue.

When she pulls away, she smiles and tilts her glass at him. "I'm empty."

He takes her glass, refills both flutes, and brings them to the rail again. As they stand watching the water, a fish leaps up above the surface and back down again. Carol, startled at the sight, laughs, and Daryl chuckles.

Later that night, in their borrowed bedroom in the Barron's cabin, in the low glow of an oil lamp, beneath a heavy sheet, they make love, with tender sighs, soft petting, and gentle rocking that ends in echoed groans.

Carol spoons naked in Daryl's arms afterward, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing and feeling the thudding of his heart in his chest against her bare back. He kisses her shoulder and whispers, "Happy Anniversary, Mrs. Dixon."


	71. Chapter 71

Daryl runs his arm across his sweaty brow, takes a swig from his canteen, and surveys the progress. The logs have been laid across the base of the cabin in four layers on all four sides. There are several layers to go, and then more sanding, the chinking, the roof, and finally the floor.

"Man," Dante says from beside him, "we can't be doing this in high afternoon in June. If you want my help again, it's got to be before ten in the morning."

Mitch likes to hunt early, also to avoid the heat and because more animals are stirring in the early hours. So that means if Daryl wants Dante's help - and he doesn't just want it, he _needs_ it – he'll have to wait until his next day off. "A'ight. Do it Friday mornin'. Start at seven."

Dante fishes a cigarette out of his front pocket and lights up. He blows out the smoke and says, "How'd you quit, man? The smokes?"

"Just ran out."

"Well that doesn't help me."

Daryl nods because Carol has strolled to a stop beside them. She puts a hand, which holds a sheet of notebook paper, to her forehead to block the sun while she surveys the logs. "It looks like it's coming along well." She lowers the paper. "I was wondering, Dante, if you might be willing to sign my petition to get on the ballot?"

Dante appears confused. "For the Town Council election?"

"Yes."

"You're running for Town Council?"

"That's the idea." She raises the paper with a smile.

"But you just became a citizen six weeks ago."

"That's true," she agrees. "But I have experience governing. I've been studying the town charter and observing all of the open town halls, and I have some ideas for the future, including for trade. You wouldn't be agreeing to _vote_ for me. This is just to say you think I should be allowed to be on the ballot."

"I know how it works," Dante says.

"So will you sign?"

"I don't know. Inola's running, you know."

"Man, just sign the fuckin' paper," Daryl growls.

Carol shoots Daryl a warning look.

"Are you going to be strong-arming people at the polls, too?" Dante asks him.

"'Course not," mutters Daryl, sorry for his outburst. Politicking is not his strong suit.

Dante holds his cigarette between his teeth and gestures for the paper. Carol hands it to him along with a ball point pen. Most of those don't work anymore, but every now and then, if you heat the tip over a candle, you can get one flowing. Usually, they rely on pencils as well as feather pens dipped in ink made from tar, pitch, and the burnt bones of animals and walkers.

Dante lays the paper on top of the pile of un-lain logs and scrawls his signature across the page. He hands back the paper and reaches into his front pocket. "Now you and Daryl both sign Inola's." He unfolds the paper and hands it to her.

"You weren't kidding about being her campaign manager, were you?" Carol asks as she signs the page. She hands Daryl the pen, and he signs, too, on line number thirty. "You should ask her on a formal date," Carol tells Dante. "You could row her out to the lighthouse island and take her on a picnic."

Dante takes back Inola's petition, folds it three times, and tucks it in his pocket. He slides the cigarette from his lips. "Why would you say that?"

Carol shrugs. "Because you like her."

"She's my best friend's wife."

"She _was_ your best friend's wife. Now she's _your_ best friend."

Dante takes another puff and contemplates her warily as he blows out the smoke. "Good luck with your petition," he says.

When she's gone, Dante leans back against the dwindling pile of logs. "What was your wife getting at, about me asking Inola out? Did Inola _say_ something to her?"

Daryl screws the cap on his canteen "Dunno. Don't think so. Carol just thinks, ya know, ya should act on how ya feel 'bout 'er."

"How _do_ I feel about her?"

Daryl shrugs. "Some people…they say yer in love with 'er."

Dante doesn't deny it, but he asks, "Would you ever make a move on your best friend's wife?"

"Nah. No." Of course, that's easy for him to say. Michonne is pretty, strong, and smart. He respects her. But he's never felt for her anything like the strange, unsettling longing he's had for Carol since he doesn't know when. "'Cept…maybe…." he admits, "If m' best friend 'd been King 'Zekial."

"You weren't friends?" Dante asks.

"Nah. Mean, I knew 'em. Weren't _friends_ though."

"Yeah. That's exactly what I thought. Because if he _had_ been your best friend, you and Carol wouldn't be together." Dante drops his cigarette and grinds the butt beneath his heel. "Let's go ahead and lay another layer."

[*]

Carol only needs thirty signatures to be on the ballot, but she doesn't want to get them from any of her Kingdom people, including Daryl. She wants to appear to have broader support. So far, she only has two signatures – Shannon's and Dante's. She would have asked Garland, but he was already out the door when she woke up.

She has until June 14 to secure her thirty signatures. Then she has two week to campaign. On July 1, people will come to the council chambers to cast their ballots, which will be counted by Marjory, the seventy-year-old woman who serves as the court reporter, and then verified in a second county by Sheriff Earl. Then, on July 2, the new Town Council will be installed. Finally, on July 3, in a second election, the mayor will be chosen from among the council members.

Carol finds Sherriff Earl in the jailhouse, sitting at the small wooden table across from the empty cells and reviewing yesterday's complaints. She asks him to sign her petition, and he says, "You know, _my wife_ Ana is running for Town Council."

"I know. Signing the petition doesn't obligate you to vote for me."

Earl closes the spiral notebook he was reading. "I'm sorry, but I don't think I should."

"Do you think I'd make a poor candidate?"

"Not at all. I think you'd make a popular candidate, given your legendary history. I also think you have thirty-two votes entirely in the bag already – everyone from the Kingdom, plus Garland and Shannon. Frankly, my wife doesn't need the competition."

"There are nine spots on the council. We could both be elected."

Earl fidgets with one end of his black, handlebar mustache. "Nine spots, yes, but most of the people here…they won't be comfortable putting down the names of more than two or three women. And I hear Inola's running. Carolyn, too, for re-election. Only two or three of you are going to make it. Not all four."

"You don't know that for sure."

"I've lived in this town for six years, Carol. That's about five years and ten months longer than you have."

Carol lowers the petition she holds and feels a bit humbled by the reminder of her freshness.

"Don't get me wrong," Earl continues. "I have faith in you. I deputized you after all. But in these dangerous times, people favor male leadership."

"Things change. They did for us. You wouldn't believe it, I suppose, but, a woman leads Alexandria. A woman used to lead the Hilltop, and now another one still does, as part of a triumvirate. And a woman leads Oceanside, of course."

"You have to know how unusual that is. It would have been unusual in the old world. Even more so in this one."

"Jamestown has changed, too, a lot, just in the short time since Daryl and I were first here. It went from an appointed hierarchy to a democratically elected town council. Garland said Ana was the only woman to serve on the council during the transition. But after the transition there were _three_. Maybe next time there _will_ be four."

"That would be about forty-five percent of the council. Women are less than thirty-five percent of Jamestown. It's not going to happen. You're qualified, and I think you'd do well in the position. But I can't sign the petition. I can't tell my wife I supported the woman who's probably going to unseat her."

"Even if all four of us aren't elected," Carol asks, "what makes you think Ana would be the one unseated?"

"The first time Ana was elected, during the transition, only nine people put their names in for council. The second time, only ten. This time? I know of at least thirteen who are running. Dante's been campaigning for Inola for weeks. He's doing a good, hard sell, and the workmen love her because they think she'll have their interests at heart, and there's currently no one on the council to represent them. Carolyn is going to get the vote of every family who's dog or horse she's saved, and of every man who still vainly hopes to date her one day."

"Vainly?" Carol asks.

"She's a lesbian. But they all hold out hope for her conversion, and she lets them."

Carol folds her petition and slides it back into her pocket. "Well, thank you for your insight, Sheriff. Good luck to your wife." She turns and heads out the door.

"Good luck, deputy!" Earl calls after her, even though she knows he doesn't really mean it.

Twenty-eight signatures still to go.

[*]

Carol tries stopping by the barns next, to see if she can get the veterinarian's signature, but Carolyn seems as wary of the competition as Earl was. "Is Daryl running, too?" she asks as she clips shut her veterinarian bag.

"No."

"Anyone else from the Kingdom?" She strokes the horse she was treating.

"Not that I know of."

"You'll be my main competition if you run. Jamestown isn't going to elect more than three women."

"That's what Earl said," Carol mutters.

"He's not wrong."

Carol folds up her paper, slides it back into her pocket unsigned, and moves on.

Twenty-eight signatures still to go.

 **[*]**

Carol makes her way down to the docks. She finds Marcus gutting fish. Since he's not planning to run for re-election, maybe _he'll_ sign her petition.

He agrees to, but before he signs, he says, "If you _do_ get elected, maybe you'll recommend me for the trade team to Oceanside?"

"You know I can't make that sort of direct campaign promise. That would border on bribery. But I can promise I'll argue for three trips a year, and I'll also support your idea of crabbing in the Chesapeake while the trade team is there, because it's a good idea."

"Oysters, too. We can get oysters in the Bay. I used to live in Maryland, you know. On the Chesapeake. But I guess your Oceanside is on the Virginia side?"

"Yes. How did you end up here?"

"As soon as it started, I got my family onto our crab boat. I had a really good filter for freshwater lakes and rivers. So we just lived on the Bay and the river, sailing around, fishing and crabbing. Sometimes we'd dock and scavenge. Anyway, after I lost my family…I drifted down here eventually. Jamestown took me in."

Carol doesn't ask what happened to his family. It's usually not a story anyone wants to tell, but she does ask what happened to his boat.

"I didn't see the water gates. Ran up on one. It tore up the bottom of the boat. They tried to fix my boat, but it wasn't worth repairing. It was pretty run down by then anyway. So they just chopped it up for parts. That was my price of admission."

He signs his name and hands back the petition.

One more down. Twenty-seven signatures left to go.

[*]

Carol continues down the docks toward the recently returned _Godspeed_ , where she stops to ask Captain Cummins and the young Lieutenant James Witherspoon to sign her petition. The sailors have dispersed from the boat, and the last of the fishing nets is being hauled off. The captain seems surprised by the request, which makes Carol wonder if her bid is going to seem presumptuous to many, but he signs without hesitation. That leads Carol to believe he isn't the least bit concerned he won't be re-elected.

Lieutenant Witherspoon, however, hems and haws.

"He's afraid you'll take his spot," Captain Cummins says with a smirk. "He's running too, you know."

"Inola mentioned it."

"You shouldn't be afraid of competition, Lieutenant," the captain tells him as he holds out the pen and paper to him. "You should rise to meet it."

"Yes, sir," Lieutenant Witherspoon agrees and takes the petition and the pen.

Twenty-five signatures left to go.

[*]

Carol spies Daryl's hunting partner Mitch leaning back against the low stone wall in the grass along the docks, where he's chatting with a cleanly shaven, blue-eyed, brown-haired sailor. The sailor is smoking a cigarette and falls silent when Carol approaches.

"Hey, Mitch," she says. "I was wondering if you might sign my petition to be on the ballot?"

"So I'm allowed to mention you're running now?"

"Sorry. Did Daryl scare you into silence?"

"Something like that." He takes the paper, signs it, and hands it back.

Carol doesn't know the sailor, so she asks his name, which turns out to be Harry. "Reminds me of my son. His name is Henry. He lives in his girlfriend's camp, in Oceanside. I'd love to establish trade with them. I think it would benefit Jamestown to visit the annual trade fair that's going to be held there." She glances at his sailor's hands and, not seeing a wedding ring, ventures, "The camp has a population that's about seventy percent female."

At first, the sailor blinks disinterestedly, and it occurs to Carol this may be the sailor that Daryl told her is "deep in the closet," the one who doesn't want to be Mitch's boyfriend, but doesn't mind having sex with him on occasion. Harry looks a little young for Mitch, maybe twenty-nine to Mitch's forty-five, but age differences have grown less and less relevant in these times.

"Did you hear that?" Mitch asks, a little coolly. "All those women? It must be like a dream come true for a straight-as-an-arrow sailor like you. Clearly you're going to want Carol on the council."

"Yeah. Of course." Harry reaches for the petition, and Carol hands it to him to sign.

Twenty-three signatures to go.

[*]

Since she's near the museum, Carol stops by the mayor's office. The blinds are open and she can see that Garland asleep in a pile of papers on his desk.

She knocks on the open doorframe, and he snorts awake suddenly. "What time is it?" he half yells.

She suppress a chuckle. "Did the baby keep you up last night?"

He rubs his eyes. "Every damn night. Shannon _tries_ to let me sleep since I have to work for her rations and Gary's _and_ do all this…" He waves at the mess of papers before him. "But I wake up every time VanDaryl cries, and it takes me twenty minutes to fall back to sleep." He sighs. "At least Gary sleeps like a rock with those earplugs. I can't sleep with anything in my ears."

"Sorry to wake you."

"No, _thank you_. I have work to do. Two hours of cleaning fish when the _Godspeed_ gets back."

"It's back."

"And then…" He slams an open file folder shut. "I have to deal with the rest of this mess." He pushes back his chair to stand.

"Before you go…I was wondering if you might sign my petition to be on the ballot?"

Garland blinks in surprise. "For Town Council?"

"Shannon didn't tell you?"

"No."

"Well, she's the one who first suggested I run."

"I guess Shannon and I don't talk as much these days." Garland reaches out for the petition.

"You should make time to talk," Carol advises him. Shannon has mentioned to Carol that she feels like she and Garland have been drifting apart since the baby was born.

"If only I had the power to create time." He lays the paper on the desk and scrawls his name on line eight. "Why hasn't Daryl signed it?"

"I asked him not to. I'm trying to get all non-Kingdom names."

"No one sees the petitions except the two people who verify them. All the citizenry knows is that you got thirty signatures. It doesn't matter."

"It matters to me. If I can't get thirty non-Kingdom people to sign, that probably means I shouldn't run."

Garland hands back the petition. "That's a smart way to look at it. Good luck to you." He hurries out his office door, so distracted that he doesn't even shut off the lights.

Garland _always_ shuts off the lights.

Carol clicks the light switch down and shuts the door behind herself when she leaves.

Twenty-two signatures to go.


	72. Chapter 72

Daryl slouches in the arm chair with VanDaryl asleep against his chest and strokes the five-week-old's fine, soft, reddish-brown hair. Carol sits reading in the rocking chair, stealing fond glances at Daryl with the baby, while Shannon gives Gary a little much-needed mama time by playing Hi Ho Cherry Oh with him.

The sun is setting and Gary is packing up the game when Garland opens the cabin door. He hangs his threadbare white Stetson, which he's taken to wearing now that it's June and the sun is brighter, on a peg on the back of the door, wolfs down the meal that's been kept lukewarm for him, pushes the plate aside, and opens two ledgers on the kitchen table.

Carol lays aside her book and picks up his empty plate to scrub it in the plastic washtub on the counter.

"Baby," Shannon calls from the couch she's just sat down on while Gary goes to play with Dog, "come cuddle on the couch with me and relax."

"Can't. The accounts are off. I've got to reconcile them before the Council Meeting tomorrow evening."

"But you've been gone since sunrise," Shannon complains.

Garland rests his elbow on the table, his head on his hand, and turns a page of the ledger. He erases a number and writes in another.

"Garland," Shannon scolds. "It can _wait_."

"No, Shannon, it _can't_. I should have finished this yesterday."

"You've been working non-stop for the past – "

Garland throws down his pencil. "And why do you think that is?" he snaps. "I have a family to support. One that keeps…" He flings his hand in the direction of VanDaryl. "Growing."

"Yeah, well you planted that seed," Shannon says sharply.

"I know. And that's _why_ I'm working so hard."

Carol, feeling tense at the argument unraveling before her, dries the now clean dish and stacks it with the others.

"Do you want me to go back to work in the gardens?" Shannon asks. "Is that it? I don't have to wait until the baby's sleeping through the night. I can go back to work tomorrow if you need me to."

"No. Of course not. You're barely sleeping. You have to feed the baby every few hours still. You're still serving on the Council until July, and that takes hours. I'm not _asking_ that of you. I don't mind working for the other half of your rations or for Gary's, but I don't need to come home to your nagging on top of it."

"My nagging?" Shannon raises her voice and repeats, "My _nagging_?" Carol can only see the back of Daryl's head in the chair, but she can tell he's tensed up. "Is _that_ what you call asking for a little time with my husband?"

"You know," Garland replies, raising his voice in turn, "instead of always guilting me over the fact that I don't have as much time as I would like to spend with the family, because I'm so busy _supporting_ my family - a goddamn _thank you_ would be nice!"

VanDaryl stirs and cries. "Look what you've done now. You've made the baby cry." Shannon comes over to take the baby from Daryl.

Garland rubs his eyes. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you." He sighs. "It's been stressful."

"Not just for you," Shannon says pointedly as she pops VanDaryl on her breast. Daryl looks away.

"I know." Garland picks up the pencil again. "I really _do_ need to get this done."

Shannon frowns, but she turns her attention to Gary instead, who looks frightened by the raised voices. "Go pick a book, Gare Bear," she says softly. "I'll read to you and tuck you in while I feed baby brother."

Carol, distressed by the domestic spat, takes the dirty dish water out to dump as an excuse to gather her thoughts. She's pouring it into the settlement's rustic drainage system beneath one of the washing troughs when Daryl joins her, saying, "Feel like I need a damn smoke after all that arguin'."

"Well don't restart smoking now."

"They don't usually fight like that."

"No," she agrees. "They don't." But things have felt tense in the Barron cabin for the past two weeks.

"Ain't _never_ heard Garland swear at her 'fore."

"I don't think I've ever heard him swear _period_."

"'S that why she's been sleepin' on the couch? 'Cause they been fightin'? Thought it was to be with the baby in the livin' room, to feed it without wakin' Gary."

"I don't know." Carol hands Daryl the empty tub to carry back.

"Don't like it," Daryl grumbles. "'Sposed to be…They ain't s'posed to be like that!"

Carol knows why he's so upset. It goes beyond the mere concern of a friend. Starting with their first stay in the Barron cabin before they were married, Garland's been his model for a husband, because the whole idea of _being_ a husband is completely foreign to him – something he never imagined he would become. So if Shannon and Garland's marriage is struggling, what does that mean for them?

Carol reaches out and squeezes his hand. "We're _good_ , you and me," she reassures him. "And they will be, too. Every marriage has its down moments. Even the best ones. Having a baby and a preschooler at the same time can put a strain on any marriage. But I think we can help."

"How?"

[*]

When they go inside the cabin later, Gary is asleep behind the closed door of the bedroom, and VanDaryl is slumbering in his cradle in the living room. Shannon is settling a pillow and a blanket on the couch, while Garland continues to work silently at the kitchen table.

Daryl stands with one arm slung across the mantle of the fireplace, and Carol sits in the rocking chair and announces, "Daryl and I have decided it's time we start paying rent. We've been taking advantage of your generosity. That has to stop."

Garland looks up from his ledger.

"You haven't been taking advantage!" Shannon insists as she sits on the couch. "Carol, you've been cooking dinner four nights a week and helping in the private garden. Daryl's been great with Gary and the baby and fixing things around the cabin, and – "

"- which is what _any_ roommate should be doing," Carol interrupts. " _Sharing_ the household chores. But we haven't been paying _rent_. So here's what we're going to do. Daryl and I are each going to work an extra ten hours a week doing whatever work Garland would normally do for your rations." That will leave Garland with just ten hours of labor on top of his work as mayor instead of the thirty he was doing.

"We can't accept that," Garland says.

"Can't we though?" Shannon asks. "Garland, baby - "

"- I'm capable of providing for my own family, Shannon."

"No one said you weren't _capable_ ," Shannon insists.

"Ain't charity, man!" At the sound of his master's voice, Dog whines at looks up from his throne on the deer skin rug. Daryl walks up to the table where Garland sits and lowers his voice. "Think of _my_ pride, brother. Been freeloadin' off ya like some deadbeat cousin."

It's a good line, one that lets Garland save face.

"All right," Garland agrees. "It would be good for me to be able to put Gary to bed more often. To spend more time with my wife. I've…" He looks at Shannon. "I've missed that."

Shannon comes over to the kitchen table. "I've missed it, too." She puts her hands on his shoulders and kisses the top of his head.

Daryl stroll back to the mantle as Garland puts his hands over Shannon's and says, "I'm sorry I swore at you. I'm sorry my mind's been elsewhere lately."

"I appreciate all your hard work. All you do for your family," Shannon replies. "I'm sorry if it seemed like I was taking that for granted."

Garland closes the ledger. "If one of you can take my three-hour shift cleaning fish in the afternoon tomorrow, I can reconcile these accounts then instead of tonight. They'll still be done by the meeting."

"Can take it," Daryl says. "Mitch wants to be back from huntin' by noon anyhow."

Carol and Daryl leave them in the living room with the sleeping baby to talk it out. They retire to their bedroom and dress lightly for bed. Carol opens the windows while Daryl cranks the pullies of the manual ceiling fan to get it running, and then they slide beneath a thin sheet. They cuddle and talk intemittently while listening to the indistinct hum of conversation from the living room as well as the sound of some laughing children catching lightening bugs outside.

"Glad we're doin' this for 'em," Daryl says. "But 'm gonna have less time to work on the cabin."

"Less energy, too. But maybe you should slow down on the cabin anyway. Only work on it when you have Dante's help."

Daryl makes a doubtful noise and changes the topic. "How's yer petition comin' long?"

Carol sighs. "Not as well as I hoped. But I'll get more signatures tomorrow."

"Just get Kingdom people to sign it," he mutters.

"You know I don't want to do it that way. And this way I'll get a better idea of the political landscape."

"Seems like a shitton of work. All this governin."

"I think the mayor has too many duties that should be shared more equally among the council members. Or the mayor should get full rations for that role instead of half. That's an issue I'll raise if I'm elected to the Council."

"Ain't no if," Daryl assures her as he pulls her back into his embrace. He kisses the top of her head. "'S hot. Think 'em gonna strip naked."

"Becuase of the heat?" she asks. "Or because you want to screw around?"

"Well, if ya insist, might could be convinced."

Carol laughs.

 **[*]**

Carol's on morning patrol the next day for four hours. She makes her rounds through the Indian Village, but things are quiet because most people are at work. However, toward the end of her shift, through an open window of one of the huts, she hears Bob and Mary arguing loudly followed by the sound of a loud slap. She peers in through the open window, and finds Bob rubbing his cheek. "You bitch!" he says, and raises his hand and slaps her back.

Mary shoves Bob against their wooden hutch, which rattles when he hits it. A glass rolls off onto the dirt floor of the hut and cracks.

"Stop!" Carol orders. She bursts through the privacy beads that hang in the open doorway of the hut, because very few of these huts have doors.

"She hit me first," Bob says.

Carol knows she did, because she saw him rubbing the red welt on his cheek. This is the couple Earl warned her about, and she's had to break up their arguments before. Mary is three inches taller than her lean, bald husband, and about fifty pounds heavier. She stands with her hands on her hips, ferociously glaring at Carol. "You ain't got no authority be inside our house," Mary says.

"I do if I'm interrupting a physical altercation, which is precisely what I'm doing." Carol sighs. "Why don't you two just get a divorce and go your separate ways? How long are you going to keep at this?"

"He don't want no divorce," Mary says, "'cause there ain't no one else who would take him!"

"Ain't no else who'd take you neither, bitch!" Bob shouts back.

"There's a long line of men who'd be happy to take me! They'd be happy to take _any_ woman."

"Yeah, but they wouldn't be happy to _keep_ you."

Carol rubs her eyes in frustration. She wishes she could assign blame to one side. It would be easier that way. But Earl is right. As far as she can tell, they both give as good as they get. "There are better ways to resolve arguments than resorting to force," Carol tells them. "You two are going to have to learn them."

Mary takes a step closer, until she's in Carol's face. "I don't know what you're still doing in our hut, _deputy_."

Carol takes a step back. "Even if you're in your hut," Carol warns her, "and things get too loud, I can site you for noise disturbance."

"Not before ten p.m. you can't," Bob insists. "And not after seven a.m. Don't think we don't know our rights."

Carol rests a hand on the hilt of her knife. This can't go on. It can't keep going on. Someone is going to end up dead one day. "I'm arresting you both for battery."

"What?" the couple asks in shocked chorus.

"I'm arresting you, Mary, for battering your husband. And I'm arresting you, Bob, for battering your wife."

"He ain't gonna press charges," Mary insists.

"Neither is she," Bob adds.

"Technically, you don't have to. _I'm_ pressing charges as an officer of the law."

"You can't do that!" Mary yells.

"As a matter of fact, I can. You can read the town charter for yourself. Deputies can press charges on behalf of Jamestown. They often do, in cases of murder and theft."

"We ain't murdered no one! We ain't stole shit!"

"I'm not arresting your for murder or theft. I'm arresting your for battery. And I'm going to keep arresting you, and keep pressing charges, and you're going to keep going to trial, every time it happens until you _stop_."

Mary glowers and takes a step closer, but when Carol unsnaps the sheath around her knife, Mary's eyes widen. She steps back.

"Now I'm going to walk you both to the jail house," Carol says calmly. "Please don't make me cuff you."

Back in the jailhouse, she puts them in separate cells while Sheriff Earl watches. After she locks Bob in, the sheriff says, "May I speak to you outside for a moment?"

Carol follows him out the open doorway and toward the chapel. He stops halfway there and turns to face her. "If they don't press charges, we usually just write them up for public disturbance and let it go at that. This wasn't even a public disturbance. It was in their own hut."

"But _we_ can press charges. I've read that in the charter."

"We _can_ , yes," he agrees. "We usually _don't_. The trial would just be he said, she said - "

"- And _I_ said. Because I'm a witness. I saw what happened through the open window. Sheriff, this has to stop. We need to take action to stop it. If they know it won't be tolerated – "

"- The jury will acquit when it's clear they're both culpable. It's a waste of time. I'm going to release them."

Carol shakes her head. "If you release them after I said we were pressing charges, that's going to damage my authority."

Earl smooths his moustache. It's a habit that's starting to annoy Carol. In fact, that moustache is starting to annoy Carol. Who does he think he is? Wyatt Earp? "Maybe you should have thought of that before you jumped the gun and arrested them."

"Listen," Carol insists, "even if the jury acquits, it will be a huge inconvenience for them – "

"- _and_ for the court."

"It will send a _message_. The message that we take this seriously enough to try it. Maybe that message will be _heard_. And you know…Maybe they could be sentenced to marriage counseling."

Earl's fingers freeze on the ends of his mustaches. She thinks he's about to laugh at the suggestion, but instead he says, "We do have a farmer who _used_ to be a psychologist in the old world. I think he was a family counselor, in fact." He lowers his hand from his moustache to his belt buckle. "I never thought of a sentence of _marriage counseling_. If the jury knew it had that option, instead of jail time or fines or flogging, it _might_ convict." He chews on his bottom lip for a moment and seems to mull it over. "All right then. I'll put it on the court docket. You'll have to testify. And you don't get paid for your time in court, and it doesn't count toward your hours."

"I understand that."

Carol leaves her shift for the morning feeling like she's accomplished something. When she gets back to the cabin, Gary is at preschool, but VanDaryl rests in his sling across Shannon's chest. She's making lunch over the wood stove while she sings to him. "Want some soup, Carol?"

"I'd love some. Can I set the table for you?"

"Please do." She stirs the soup while Carol pours water from the pitcher and sets out the bowls and spoons. She knows Daryl packed snacks to eat after the hunt and on his way to cleaning fish. "Will Garland be home for lunch?"

"No, he's in his office working on those accounts. But we had a nice, long talk last night. And then VanDaryl even let us sleep in a little after his middle-of-the-night feeding."

Carol did notice Shannon wasn't on the couch and no one was awake when she left.

"I see you got an apology, too." Carol gestures to the glass vase full of tulips on the center of the table. "Those don't look wild."

"Old Mrs. Merriweather grows them. She usually charges men a little somethign to buy a dozen for their ladies, but I think Garland just had to flirt with her to get them."

When she sits down with Carol at the table, Shannon peeks in the sling and declares, "He sleeps really well in this thing. I think I'm just going to start wearing him all day."

Carol smiles and dips a spoon in the soup. She blows on it gently.

"Thank you so much for agreeing to help us earn rations," Shannon says. "It won't be long, I promise. I'll be off the council come July, and back working in the gardens by August. VanDaryl should be sleeping more by then. It won't be hard to schedule the gardening between feedings – two hours here, two hours there – until I get my twenty. Council work isn't as convenient. I can't set my own schedule. And it only counts for ten hours, even though it takes up twice as much time."

"So am I getting in over my head running for council, do you think?"

"Oh, I'm sure you can handle it. And once you're on it, you'll only have to patrol two or three days a week."

" _If_ I'm on it. I'm not sure I'm going to be elected."

"Well, hurry up and finish your soup and then get back out there to collect those signatures! Try Old Mrs. Merriweather first. Compliment her tulips."

Carol does finish her soup, but she also does the dishes before she heads out the door with her petition.


	73. Chapter 73

After lunch, Carol finds old Mrs. Merriweather where Shannon said she would, outside one of the small, one-room, thatch-roofed cabins that were original to the recreation of James Fort. The old woman is tending her tulips in a small garden box, and she says she'll be happy to sign Carol's petition. She takes the paper and tells Carol to "Come, come, come sit on the porch and visit!"

The "porch" is a well-swept dirt area in front of the door with two rocking chairs. Mrs. Merriweather sits down in one with the paper, but makes no move to sign it. Carol sits in the other and listens to the old lady chat. She learns that Mrs. Merriweather, who is now eighty-one, lives here with her grandson, Harry, who is a sailor.

"Oh, I know Harry," Carol tells her. "He signed my petition."

"Did he, now? Harry is such a sweet boy. You know, ever since they told me I was too forgetful to work for the company anymore, he's been working extra hard to take care of me." Mrs. Merriweather pushes off the dirt and her chair rocks gently.

"What company?" Carol asks in confusion.

"The car company. I was their receptionist, you know. It's just over yonder." She points in the direction of the Indian Village. "I _do_ wish Harry would bring a girlfriend home for dinner sometime. I don't know if I'm going to live to see my great-grandbabies at this rate."

Carol smiles and doesn't tell her that she suspects a wife isn't in Harry's future, but maybe a husband _could_ be. "Well, he was kind to sign my petition."

"Oh, you want me to sign this, don't you?" Mrs. Merriweather lifts the pen. She blinks a moment and looks at Carol. "You're Donald's wife, aren't you?"

"No. My husband is Daryl."

" _Daryl_? I don't remember that one. I'm sorry. Sometimes I forget all of my boys' names. I have six after all! Is Daryl the redhead?"

"No, ma'am. Daryl's not one of your sons."

"Oh, that's a shame. I'd have liked you for a daughter-in-law." She looks at the paper. "What was I about to do with this?"

"Don't worry about that," Carol tells her and takes the pen and paper back. It doesn't seem right to take the signature of a woman who doesn't seem to have her senses fully about her.

"Do you have to go now, dear?" Mrs. Merriweather asks.

"I should probably be on my way."

"Well you come back and visit, you hear?"

"I will," Carol promises, and it's a promise she intends to keep. She leaves with a bitter-sweet feeling …sadness at the slipping of the woman's mind, but gratitude that she has a grandson to look after her, and her tulips to tend, in a town that's safe behind sturdy fences from the monsters she may have forgotten exist.

[*]

Carol stops by the blacksmith shop and gives her spiel when he and his apprentice pause from their work. "I hear you're trying to get a trade trip to Oceanside?" the blacksmith says.

"I am."

"If you end up on the council, would you consider me for the trade team?"

Carol smiles. Every single man wants to be on that trade team, it seems. "I can't make those kinds of promises. And I'm sure it won't be up to me to select the team if the council agrees to the trip."

"Well, I do like the idea of it." The blacksmith signs his name across the paper: _Christopher Pedersen._

"I'll sign, too, ma'am," says the apprentice, who takes the paper from the blacksmith.

Carol makes the mistake of saying, "I think all signers have to be seventeen or older." That's the voting age, and the age required to be selected for jury service.

The young man's face darkens. "I _am_ seventeen."

The blacksmith chuckles. "Don't worry, son. It feels like an insult now, but when you're fifty, you'll be glad the ladies think you're forty. Go ahead and sign."

The young man scribbles the name _Jacob Miller_ across the page and hands her the paper. "In case you're wondering about the different last names, Mr. Pedersen just calls _everyone_ under twenty-five son," Jacob says. "I'm one of the orphans from Powhattan Creek Park." That's where Shannon's camp was, before they tried to invade Jamestown. "But I live on my own. I support _myself_. Because I'm _seventeen_."

"Well, Mr. Big Shot," the blacksmith says with a smirk. "Get back to work."

 _Twenty signatures still to go._

[*]

As Carol's passing the jailhouse, Sheriff Earl stops her and tells her Bob and Mary's trial is starting shortly.

"Already?" Carol just arrested them less than two hours ago.

"There was nothing on the docket for this afternoon," Earl says. "And I spoke to that family counselor to see if he'll counsel them if that's their sentence. He agreed, but he wants payment of a full week's worth of tobacco rations, so the penalty would have to include that fine."

"Is that going to make the jury less likely to agree to it?"

"Yes. But we certainly can't conscript a counselor without pay."

"Could the community pay for it?" Carol asks.

"I doubt very much the Town Council will approve that," Earl replies. "The community already pays the judge, prosecutor, and defense attorney for their time, as well as me and all you deputies. That work counts toward our twenty hours even though it doesn't actually produce any _food_. People appreciate the hunters and farmers and fishermen. They don't always appreciate the work of lawmen, even if our work assures them peace and order. We shouldn't push it by asking the community to pay for some couple's counseling. They'll have to be compelled to pay for it themselves."

Carol nods. He has a fair point.

"I've talked to my wife about the counseling," Earl continues, "and as judge she'll include it as an option in her sentencing instructions to the jury. You need to testify. So go on home and put on your gold star and a prettier shirt and be back in forty minutes."

Carol doesn't like being told to put on a _prettier_ shirt, but she tries not to show her annoyance in her face. She thinks of how Garland dressed for court – in that black vest and crisp white shirt and bolo tie. So she goes back to the Barron cabin and finds the nicest button-down blouse she _can_ find – which isn't much prettier than the one she's wearing – presses it quickly with a camp iron – and returns ready for court in half an hour.

The defense attorney tries to make something of the fact that she set foot inside a private residence without invitation, but Carol knows the precise line of the charter to cite giving her that authority to do so if it's necessary to prevent a physical assault. Bob and Mary both claim their altercation was "barely physical," and that they should be left to their own disputes. "Do any of y'all on the jury really want meddlesome deputies sticking their noses in _your_ family business?" Mary asks on the stand. "Y'all better think about that!"

Carol, who is now sitting in the witness pew, notices a couple of jury members nodding at this and begins to lose hope.

The prosecutor calls as witness a resident of the Indian Village who has witnessed numerous physical altercations between the couple. "Are you worried that these altercations will result in severe injury one day?"

"Someone's going to end up dead," the woman replies.

When the defense attorney cross examines her, he asks, "Have any of these disputes resulted in a conviction of either of my clients?"

"Well…I don't think they've ever been tried before," the woman replies.

"So in short, this is all heresy."

"Well, everyone knows – "

"- it's heresy," the defense attorney interrupts. "No further questions for this witness."

The trial is speedy and takes less than an hour from start to finish. The judge, Ana, who is still serving in that capacity, as well as on the Town Council, advises the jury that if they return a guilty verdict, in their sentencing they may choose from "among the standard penalties for battery. The lowest penalty is a written citation to be entered in the court record, along with a fine of one week's tobacco rations, This sentence can only be issued for a first conviction, which this would be for either member of this couple. The next highest penalty would be a higher fine, to be determined by the jury, of up to three week's tobacco rations or up to two months' coffee beans, to be entered in the community storehouse. And the highest penalty would be a flogging of up to four stripes. But the court is allowing a fourth penalty to be considered in this case. If you find this couple guilty, you may sentence the defendants to six sessions of marriage counseling, to be provided by Ryan Owens, a former family therapist, in exchange for a payment of one week's tobacco rations. So this penalty would also involve a fine, and it would require you to find both parties guilty. The fine would go to the counselor in exchange for his services."

The jury shares curious glances with one another.

"At this time, this court is dismissed so that the jury may deliberate." Ana pounds her gavel on the card table, and the court disperses.

Carol leaves the chapel and returns to her quest to collect signatures on her petition. She needs to do something to fill the nervous time while she awaits the verdict on her first ever arrest.


	74. Chapter 74

After the trial, Carol walks past the busy docks to the infirmary in the museum. She hopes to get Dr. Ahmad to sign her petition, if he's not concerned about losing his seat. But Dr. Ahmad is not on duty – the field medic Thomas is.

As he signs her petition, he says, "When I patched you up last year out there in those woods, I never imagined you might be in our _government_ one day. If you _do_ get elected to council, maybe you'll consider me for that trade team I hear might be going to Oceanside in November?"

That rumor has got strong legs, Carol thinks, but that's a good thing – it means the Town Council will likely approve the trip when it takes the issue up again. "I can't promise anything," she says.

"Well, you're going to need a medical professional on that ship for a journey of that length."

"I'm sure that's something the council will take into consideration," Carol assures him.

 _Nineteen signatures to go._

Next, she pops her head into the museum's laundry room where an elderly couple are folding freshly dried sheets for the orphans. She gives them her pitch, and they sign.

 _Seventeen signatures to go._

Then she goes to the armory, where she finds Daryl using the crossbow press. A man and teenage boy are also at work reloading ammunition. Daryl is immersed in his project and doesn't notice her until she pats him on the ass. He jumps and swivels and then relaxes. "Hey," he says. "Yer sneaky."

"I've learned to be." She gives him a quick kiss. "How was the hunt this morning?"

"Only got a jack rabbit 'n some squirrels. Deer tracks vanished in the creek. Find 'em tomorrow. Gotta do that three hours choppin' wood for Garland after this."

Brass clatters as its being cleaned, and powder wooshes through one of the reloading presses. As they talk, they raise and lower their voices in cadence with the sound. Carol tells him about the trial and admits she's nervous about the verdict. "If they come back with not guilty, I'm going to look like a fool for arresting them."

Daryl's mouth twitches in a sympathetic expression.

"Do you think I _shouldn't_ have arrested them?"

He shrugs. "Dunno. Don't think marriage counselin's gonna fix 'em, though. People like that…'s how they grew up. They don't know nothin' else. Ain't gonna unlearn it in six sessions talkin' to some shrink."

"But _you're_ not like that," says Carol. "And I'm not like that, despite everything we've gone through in our past. That's not how _we_ fight."

"Decided I wasn't gonna be like m' old man. Decided that a long time ago. Can't sentence someone to decide that. Got to decide that on their own."

She sighs. "I felt like I had to do _something_."

"'N ya _did_ do somethin'. Hey," he says softly. "Good luck. Hope it goes the way ya want it to. But if it don't, don't mean ya were wrong for tryin'."

"Thanks." She kisses him again and then jerks her head toward the man and teenager who are reloading. "Do you know their names?"

"Willy I think?" Daryl says. "'N Carter, maybe?"

"Guess I'll find out."

She heads over to the reloaders, who, spying her, pause in their work and lift their goggles. Carol reaches into her pants pocket and sets the spent brass she's been collecting from the practice range on the table. "There's some more for you."

"Thanks," the man, who looks like he's in his fifties, says. The other, probably an apprentice, is maybe sixteen, if Carol's judging correctly this time. But she gives her pitch to both.

"I'll sign," the older man says, "but the boy's only fifteen."

The teenager smiles apologetically while the man scrawls the name William Markwood on her petition. "I hear you might be sending a trade team to an island full of women?"

"I can't promise you'll be on the trade team," Carol replies reflexively.

"Is there going to be an application process?" William asks.

"I wouldn't know. It hasn't even been decided for sure that a team is going. But I can promise to support trade with Oceanside."

William nods. "Good luck to you, ma'am."

 _Sixteen signatures to go._

Thinking she might secure Madam Linda's signature, Carol heads for the tavern. The place has closed for the afternoon, and the staff is preparing to re-open for dinner in an hour. Deputy Andrew, who was in Garland's possee back when Carol was stabbed in the woods, is on patrol duty in the Indian Village, but he doesn't seem to be patrolling at the moment. The thirty-something man is leaned against the bar flirting with the waitress, Trisha, who is drying glasses.

Deputy Andrew jumps to attention when he sees Carol. "Hello, deputy. I was just checking in to see if they were having any trouble here this afternoon. I best be getting back to my rounds." He tips his cowboy hat to Trisha, says, "See you tomorrow night," and starts heading for the door.

Carol seizes the opportunity to ask him to sign her petition, and maybe because he's been embarrassed to be caught not really working, Andrew does, hastily.

 _Fifteen signatures to go._

"I'll sign it, too, Carol," Trisha tells her when Andrew is out the door. "We could use more women on the council."

 _Fourteen signatures to go._

Trisha signs the paper and then extends it to the other waitress, Candy, who is wiping down the bar. Candy looks down at it without taking it. "I don't know," she says. "It was women who shut the whorehut down."

"Well wouldn't you rather be waitressing?" Trisha asks her.

"I don't make nearly as much waitressing."

"You make rations _plus_ tips," Trisha insists.

"But they don't put brew and shine in the rations anymore! We have to _buy_ it now." Candy flings the wash rag around like maybe she's already had a little booze today. "I have to tend tables for almost an _hour_ just to get enough tips to buy as much booze as I used to get for a single _five-minute_ blowjob! Get enough jealous women on that council, and next thing you know, they'll be ruling that men can't buy the waitresses drinks anymore."

"You better not be turning tricks out of my tavern, Candy," says Madam Linda, who has just emerged from a storage closet behind the bar. She sets a crate on the floor and starts stocking the shelves under the bar with mason jars full of moonshine. "I run a respectable establishment now."

"And _you_ just went along with it!" Candy tells her. "Them jealous women shutting your business down!"

"Frankly, the tavern is more profitable," Madam Linda tells her. "And you're eating better than you ever have."

"I'm not _drinking_ better. And you're working harder now, aren't you?"

"I'm _enjoying_ my work for a change," Madam Linda replies. "I used to be the CFO of a chain of bars, so it's right up my alley. And I'm serious. If you're accepting drinks in return for - "

"- A _hope_ ," Candy interrupts. "I accept them in return for a _hope_. And maybe sometimes I _fulfill_ that hope, but I don't ever do it in _your_ precious tavern. I'm free to _date_. That's a private matter, isn't it? Trisha dates."

"Not like _that_ ," Trisha tells Candy. "Andrew is making me dinner tomorrow night."

"Yeah, well," says Candy, her tone dripping with sarcasm, "last month some other guy was _making you dinner_. What happened to him?"

"We weren't compatible. We broke up. Believe it or not, I'm actually looking for love."

Candy snorts. "Good luck."

"Beatrice found it," Trisha insists. "She got married!"

"She found herself a full-time sugar daddy is what she found," Candy insists. "But this isn't _Pretty Woman_ , and he ain't no Richard Gere. And neither is _Andrew_."

"Andrew's _good_ to me. And we haven't even had sex yet."

Candy chortles. "Yeah right."

"I'm serious. I'm waiting for the third date."

Madam Linda takes the petition Trisha has left on the bar and asks what it is. Carol explains, and Madam Linda signs it and pushes it back to her.

 _Thirteen signatures to go._

"Candy's not going to sign it," Madam Linda says. "She thinks it's because three women got elected to the council that the whorehut got shut down. Of course that's impossible. That decision would have also required six men."

"Yeah, and all of them are _married_ men who are jealous because their wives don't let them have any fun!" Candy says. "I'm not voting for them either!"

Trisha laughs. "Who _are_ you voting for then?"

"All the single men."

"The only single men who _are_ running," Madam Linda tells her, "are Captain Cummins, Lieutenant Witherspoon, and Gunther Hamilton. And those first two never came by the whorehut."

"Lieutenant Witherspoon came by," Trisha says. "Remember, for his twenty-first birthday? Captain John paid for him to finally pop his cherry."

"The captain was always generous like that," Candy says. "I _miss_ that big lug."

"I'd forgotten that," Madam Linda says. "The lieutenant was just an ensign then. But he never came back."

"It's a damn shame he didn't," Candy says. "Because he _is_ cute. But Gunther was a regular for a while there. I might vote for him."

"It's not like _he's_ bringing the whorehut back!" Trisha exclaims. "He only ever saw Megan, and he never came back after she died." Trisha shakes her head. "He asked to marry her, too. I don't know why she said no. Gunther's a dependable man. Smart, too. And not bad looking."

"He expected her to stop drinking if they got married," Candy says. "And to keep the baby. She wasn't having none of that." She spies a customer entering the door and shouts, "We're closed!" She starts walking briskly but not precisely in a straight line to close the saloon doors.

"Candy better sober up before the evening rush," Madam Linda mutters to Trisha, and Carol, feeling like she's listened in on this exchange too long and learned more than she wants to know already, heads out.

The customer turns out to the source of the staff's gossip, the assistant farm manager, Gunther Hamilton. He pushes his straw hat up on his head and nods a greeting to Carol. "I must have lost track of time in the fields. I guess I'll have some jerky for lunch then."

As they walk away from the tavern, she asks if he'll sign her petition. Gunther stops walking. He rubs his salt-and-pepper stubble, and she thinks he's going to turn her down, because he's also running, but he answers, "I'd be happy to. I understand you ruled an entire Kingdom once?"

"Well, it was a lot smaller than Jamestown, but…yes." After he scrawls his signature on the paper, Carol asks, "A few people wouldn't sign because they're afraid of the competition. I take it you're not?" She wants to gauge what he thinks his chances are.

"Oh, I think Jamestown is going to want a farm man on that council, and once he learned I was running, Ernesto decided not to run for re-election."

"I didn't know that." Ernesto seemed reluctant about the trade trip, so this might be good news for establishing regular journeys to Oceanside. It also means there are now only twelve people running for nine slots.

"He's already got enough work as farm manager, anyway," Gunther says. "And Ernesto's getting on in years. Not that _I'm_ a spring chicken. I just turned fifty this year."

"You say that like it's old. I feel younger than I have in years."

"Well, you're a newlywed aren't you?" Gunther asks. "That'll do it, I suppose. But that ship has sailed for me."

"Speaking of sailing ships…Whether or not I get elected to council, I'm going to be proposing a trade trip – "

"- to Oceanside," Gunther interrupts. "The island of beautiful women. So I hear. And you think you'll have my vote because I'm single and I want on that team."

"I…" Carol laughs. "Okay, yes. I was trying to feel you out on the issue."

"You'll have my vote on that issue if I'm on the council, but only because I think it'll prove good for Jamestown to make external contacts. I have far too many responsibilities here to be sailing off in pursuit of women who aren't likely going to be interested in me. But I do hope relationships eventually come from that. For the sake of the future of Jamestown – of the _world_ , really. We're an aging population here. Less than ten percent of Jamestown is under twenty-five, and fifty percent of it is over forty-five now."

"Well, Jamestown could do more to encourage families," Carol suggests. "Maternity leave, for one, at least for a few weeks, without rations being reduced. It might make more men inclined to become fathers and more women inclined to become mothers."

"It might," Gunther concedes. "But when people are expected to work extra hours for the same amount of rations so that _other_ _people's_ children can be fed, I gurantee you many of them will grumble about couples popping out mouths to feed. With the sponsorship system we have now, people can choose to work for anyone. And some do, as with the orphans. I sponsor an orphan myself. But it's a _choice_. So there's no grumbling."

"I see your point. But if you consider demographics to be a pressing concern, I hope you can see my point as well."

"I can." Gunther smiles. "Doesn't mean I necessarily agree with it, but I can certainly see it. And I look forward to working with you on the council, if we're both elected." He tips his hat to her and heads on through the village.

 _Twelve signatures to go._

As Carol's passing through the Indian Village back toward the Barron cabin, Inola calls from her window, "Deputy! I have that blanket ready." She appears in the doorway of her hut. "Come on in."

Inola's little adobe is a simple, one-room affair, but she's built a unique, high bedframe of stone against one wall, with three stone stairs leading up to it and storage space beneath, which is filled with baskets containing clothes and other items. The neatly made-up bed is covered with handwoven blankets, a few of which are layered and hang off the end. A wooden cabinet for storing food and a small square table, with a decorative, multi-colored stone table top and two wooden chairs, is the only other furniture. She also has a beautifully designed stone hearth and fireplace at the far end of the hut. Inola grabs the folded blanket from off the bed and hands it to her.

Carol lets the blanket fall loose and declares it beautiful. After folding it again, she takes her magazine out of her gun and counts out three bullets. "I guess now you can take Dante for that drink."

"Not if I frame it in those terms," Inola replies. "But I can take my brother for a drink, and then Dante will probably come along with us. And I'll buy my brother a drink, and my brother will buy Dante a drink, and Dante will buy me a drink, and say it's in honor of my late husband." She sighs. "So it goes." She lays the bullets end up on the mantle, along with ten others she's clearly saving. "I hear you're running for council?"

"I am. If I can get enough signatures to get on the ballot."

"I'd be a fool to sign for you, since you'll be my main competition, but like Dante says, I'm a terrible campaigner. And he tells me you signed mine. So where's your petition?"

Carol smiles and plucks it from her front pocket.

 _Eleven signatures to go._

[*]

Carol intends to go back to the cabin to fix everyone dinner, but Sheriff Earl grabs as she's passing the jailhouse and tells her the jury is about to return a verdict. They find both Bob and Mary guilty of battery and sentence them to a fine of one week of tobacco and six sessions of marriage counseling. "Four of us live in the Indian Village," the foreman says, "and we're all tired of the damn noise!"

Carol leaves the courthouse feeling satisfied. Sheriff Earl catches up to her. "Well done, deputy," he says, and she slows to a stop to turn to face him. "You tripped up the defense attorney with your testimony, just like you did in that treason case a year ago." He shakes his head. "I honestly didn't think a jury would convict. I guess I never gave them the chance. Thank you for giving me a nudge in the right direction. I don't know if the counseling will help or not, but, you're right. At least a message will be sent."

"Well, thank you for considering my proposal."

"That's what I have deputies for, after all. For the patrolling, of course, but also for the nudging. You still have that petition to be on the ballot?"

"I do." She looks at him curiously. "Did you want to sign it?"

"I'll sign it."

"Ana won't be upset?"

He shrugs. "I suppose if they don't elect Ana on her merits, they don't deserve her service."

Carol pulls her now well-folded petition out of her front shirt pocket and watches Earl sign his flowery cursive on line twenty.

 _Ten signatures to go._


	75. Chapter 75

Daryl is asleep in the armchair with VanDaryl curled on his chest. The man has one arm slung protectively around the infant, and the baby's back rises and falls in rhythm with Daryl's slow breathing. Carol never wished she had a camera so badly.

The baby stirs when the front door opens and Garland and Shannon return from their after-dinner council meeting. "Sorry we're late," Shannon says. "We got to sitting and talking on the docks on the way home."

"It's fine," says Carol, glad they've been reconnecting lately. "Gary's already in bed and VanDaryl hasn't woken up to eat yet."

The baby cries and Shannon takes him from his godfather, who blinks awake. "Looks like you need to put Daryl to bed, too," she says with an affectionate smirk.

"Thank you for working some of my hours today," Garland tells Daryl.

"Mhm," Daryl murmurs as he rubs his eyes. He stumbles toward the bedroom, drunk with exhaustion, and Carol follows, even though she's not quite ready to sleep yet. She wants the little family to have its private time in the living room.

Daryl's a bit more awake as he undresses for bed. He sleeps naked these days, which amazes her, because he used to sleep not only with his pants and shirt on, but with his knives, too. Now that he's safe behind walls, and has been safe in a secure marriage for a year, the vulnerability seems to bother him less than the Virginia early summer heat.

She undresses down to her underwear and a sleeveless tank top and cuddles up next to him in bed. "You smell good. Did you have your weekly hot shower in the museum?"

"Mhmh."

"I think we should get some of that soap from whoever makes it to keep by the wash basin." She breathes in against his neck. "I like it."

"Yeah?" He turns his head and kisses her. "I like you."

Carol smiles. "I like you, too."

He bends his head against her shoulder. "Wanna screw 'round?" he mumbles.

She looks down at him, at his closed eyes, and chuckles. "Sure," she says. "Anytime you're ready."

"'M ready," he murmurs, but he's already half asleep.

 **[*]**

"And to what do I owe this pleasure?" Dante asks when Carol joins him at the west gate.

"I'm doing some hours for Garland so he can have more time with his family. Since Arnie's sick today, they had him filling in. And now I'm filling in for Garland."

Dante grins. "It'll be just like old times."

Later, as they're peeling a walker off a pike, Carol says, "Inola gave me that blanket. It was beautiful." Dante walks backward to drag the badly decayed body into the woods while Carol's eyes flit around for any sign of danger. "Did she use the ammo to buy you a drink?"

Dante drops the body, stands, and looks at her warily. "She went to the tavern with Gunther Hamilton last night." Dante looks angry about that as he paces back toward the fence line. "Man's fifteen years older than her," he mutters underneath his breath.

Carol wonders if Inola knows Gunther was also a one-time frequenter of the whorehut, but surely if Carol is privy to the town gossip, long-time residents must be. And perhaps Gunther truly cared for that prostitute who died, since, according to the tavern grapevine, he never saw any other and asked her to marry him when she got pregnant with what might or might not have been his child. "Is that too old?" Carol asks with a teasing smile.

"She should be with someone closer to her age," Dante insists. "She's only thirty-five." Dante's forty, Carol knows. "And besides…Gunther used to whore it up. He might have caught something." After a few steps, Dante admits, "That's not a fair description, really. It's more complicated than that. And he's not a bad guy. He's smart. Hardworking. He's probably going to end up on the council. In fact, he's the first guy she's said yes to a date with that she might actually end up liking."

And that explains why Dante's angry, Carol thinks – he never saw any of Inola's other dates as possibly turning into anything serious. "Well, if _you_ had asked her to the tavern, I'm sure she would have preferred to go with you."

Dante stops walking and turns. "What are you doing, Carol? It's hard enough without you trying to play matchmaker."

"I'm sorry. I'm just trying to be a friend." She puts a hand on the hilt of her knife and continues walking.

Dante falls in step beside her. "I'm sorry I got snippy with you. It's just…Atohi was like a brother to me, and I promised him to look out for her." Carol raises both eyebrows for a moment, and he asks, "What?"

"Nothing. I was just thinking of something I learned in Sunday School once."

Dante's lip twitches in amusement and his deep brown eyes narrow in curiosity. "What's that?"

"In biblical times, it used to be considered a man's duty to marry his sister-in-law when his brother died. That was _how_ he looked out for her."

"Yeah, well, we don't live in biblical times. We live in the End Times. And I'm pretty sure that's _not_ what Atohi meant." He draws his knife and strides forward several yards to kill a walker caught up on a pike. After they get it pulled off, they search its pockets, because it looks fresh. They find six loose rounds of ammo and split it. They also find a small, high quality knife on its belt, which Dante agrees she can have.

"Why is it so fresh, do you think?" Carol asks.

"Probably one of those raiders. We didn't find three of the bodies."

"Mitch found two of them, and Daryl and I think we found one. And this walker looks only two or three months turned. The raid was when?"

"Eight months ago now." Dante surveys the tree line. "It could be from a small camp that recently turned. You'd think we'd have found every camp within fifty miles by now, with all the scavenging we've done over the years, but we're still finding survivors, even this far into the Great Sickness. Last summer, we found ten people hanging on in a school, out of food, and starting to die off. We brought them in."

"I'll suggest to Garland that we investigate it," Carol tells him. "In case there _is_ a camp nearby and it still has survivors in it. Or, if it doesn't have survivors, maybe it has guns and ammo. That man was clearly armed at one point."

"That cannibal could have wandered for miles. How would you even find out where it came from?"

"Daryl's an excellent tracker," Carol says a bit proudly.

 **[*]**

When Carol stops by Garland's office to discuss tracking the fresh walker back to its source, the blinds are drawn and the door is shut, but the glow through the slats suggests the lights are on inside. Thinking he's probably in a meeting, she moves on to the infirmary and finds Dr. Ahmad and asks him to sign her petition. He agrees, somewhat reluctantly, asking, "Are you sure you want to run so soon?"

"I've been studying the town charter and observing the open town halls. I feel ready."

He glances down at the twenty signatures on the page. "You know we only get half rations for being on the council? You'll still have to work ten hours a week as a deputy to get the other half."

"I'm fine with that." In fact, she'll probably work twenty hours as a deputy so she can cover Gary's children's rations, too. She's never going to have a child of her own to work for; she can work for her nephew, at least until Shannon's fully weaned VanDaryl and can take on a longer work week. "A forty-hour work week used to be normal in the old world."

"I used to work sixty-hour weeks at Eastern State Hospital," Dr. Ahmad says. " Between the infirmary and the council, I _still_ work forty-hour weeks, but I do sponsor an orphan. " Dr. Ahmad scrawls his name across the paper. "I just wanted to make sure you understood how it works."

"I understand," she assures him as he hands the petition back.

 _Nine signatures to go._

[*]

As Carol's coming back toward the Mayor's office, Shannon is stepping out and smoothing her dress. At six weeks post-birth, she hasn't gotten out of the maternity dresses yet. "Carol!" she exclaims. "Hi. I was just lunching with Garland."

"Where's the baby?"

"Daryl's back from hunting, and he's watching the little guy." Daryl left before Carol woke up this morning, probably before the sun did, so she's not surprised he's back already. "But VanDaryl's going to need to eat soon, and Daryl wanted to get to work on y'all's cabin, so I best get back there."

"I was just coming to talk to Garland about something."

"Garland, baby!" Shannon calls through the partially open door. "Incoming visitor! Make yourself decent!"

When Carol comes through the door, Garland is tucking his shirt into his pants and flushing. "Hey, Carol, can I help you?" he asks as he sits back down in his chair and rolls it forward.

Carol restrains herself from making any teasing comments about afternoon delights or the six-week mark and instead launches right into her suggestion to track the walker.

"It's a good idea. You don't need my approval, though, you need Earl's. That sort of investigation would be conducted under his independent authority." Carol must make some kind of expression, because Garland asks, "Do you have a _problem_ with Earl?"

"No. We just don't always see eye to eye."

"Because he wouldn't sign your petition?" Garland asks.

"It wasn't that. Well, it wasn't _only_ that. And he did sign it, actually."

"Then what?" Garland asks.

"He was resistant to trying Bob and Mary for battering each other." She feels a bit petty about admitting the next thing: "And he told me to put on a _prettier_ shirt for the trial."

Garland chuckles. "Sounds like Earl. I suppose he irritates the feminist in you?"

"Sometimes."

"You know, Earl's married to one of the most powerful women in this town. A councilwoman _and_ a judge. And he was the one who suggested to me that I assign you to the sheriff's department."

"He did?" Carol asks skeptically.

"Because of how you figured out Harold was up to no good from the moment he walked in our cabin door, and because of how successfully you testified afterward. Earl has my confidence. And the council's. I hope one day he'll have yours. He's one of my closest friends, and so are you."

"I meant no insult."

"I'm sure you didn't. But if he has a difference of opinion from you – I'd listen to it. I'm not saying you always have to _agree_ with it, but I'd _listen_ to it."

"I will. I do."

"And for your own sake, I'd bear in mind that he _is_ your boss. I gather you don't much like _having_ a boss?"

"I was in an abusive marriage for many years," Carol confides. "I was told what to do and never got to make my own decisions. So I think now my instinct is to push back at any sign of control. I suppose I'm still working to find a happy medium."

"You will," he tells her. Garland stands. "Good luck with the search. I suppose Shannon and I shouldn't expect you for dinner?"

"Assuming Earl approves it, we may be gone overnight."

Garland nods and sees her to the door.

[*]

Carol finds Sheriff Earl in the chapel courthouse talking with Ana. The court is empty. "Was there a trial?" Carol asks. She hadn't heard of any arrests other than the one she made yesterday.

"Divorce settlement," Ana replies. "And the last one I have to deal with in a long time, I hope. Unless Bob and Mary break up. I wouldn't mind processing _that_ split. Earl tells me that adding on an additional sentence option for their case was your idea?"

"It was."

"I like having other options to give the jury," Ana tells her, "and maybe counseling will show them they need some space from each other. Do you have all your signatures for your petition?"

"Not yet."

"I'll sign it if you have it on you."

Carol, surprised, draws out the paper from her pocket but can't find her pencil. Fortunately, Ana has one and signs her name.

 _Eight signatures to go._

"You aren't worried about the competition anymore?" Carol asks curiously.

"I've decided not to run for re-election. Good luck to you." Ana kisses Earl on the cheek and says, "Don't be so late tonight, sheriff" before heading out the open door of the chapel.

"Why isn't she running?" Carol asks Earl. She hopes it's not on _her_ account.

Earl ignores the question. "Did you need to speak to me about something?"

Carol runs her idea to track the walker by him. He agrees, saying, "An official scouting party requires a minimum of three, for safety purposes. I'll send Deputy Santiago with you and Daryl. He used to be in the Border Patrol, so he knows a bit about tracking men, too. These will be on-the-clock hours, for the purpose of rations, excluding any meal-time or camping or goofing around. You'll be on the honor system to report your time. And because this is an on-the-clock expedition, _any_ goods you find get entered into inventory for the community. You don't get to keep them yourselves."

"Understood."

"Y'all can leave first thing in the morning."

"We should really leave now," Carol insists. "While the trail is still fresh."

Earl sighs. "But you're on evening patrol tonight."

"What if I found someone to cover me?" Carol asks.

"You know what, I'll do it myself. It will mean extra hours, which will mean extra rations, and I need to store up some canned goods for the next seven months in anticipation of…" He trails off suddenly.

"Oh," Carol says, putting the pieces together. Maybe Jamestown isn't going to have a demographic problem after all. "I suppose congratulations are in order?"

Carol can tell he's trying not to smile, but Earl does, proudly. "I _didn't_ tell you. We're not telling _anyone_ yet. Promise you won't tell anyone?"

"My lips are sealed. But Ana doesn't have to drop out of the council race just because she's pregnant." It sounds like the baby won't even be born until halfway through her one-year term.

"She wants to. It's a lot of time - almost twenty hours a week for half rations. She'll continue her work as judge. She usually averages ten hours a week doing that, and I'll make up the rest, at least until the baby's weaned. And then she'll do whatever it is she wants to do. Maybe she'll run for council again. Just not _this_ year."

This means there are now only eleven people running for nine slots. Carol hopes that, if elected, she can hold her own among those who have been in Jamestown far longer. She's not sure why she wants this position so badly, except maybe that it will be the first leadership role to which she has ever been _elected_.

Carol served on the prison council, but none of them were precisely chosen for that position. There were no prison-wide election. Rather, she, Daryl, Hershel, Glenn, and Sasha stepped up when no one else would or could. The position, it seems, _chose them._ And, in the end, she was exiled from the very community she had served, without trial, and without much protest. As queen of the Kingdom, she did the best she could by her people, but she was always keenly aware she had married into – rather than been elected for – that role.

But to be an _elected_ councilwoman in Jamestown, in a world of hundreds of voters, in a world where she's a full citizen and could never be cast out without a formal trial - that would be something altogether different. The idea makes her both excited and nervous.

[*]

Daryl is mixing sand, lime, ash, and dirt outside the toolshed to make log chinking when he spies Carol walking toward him. He looks for a glass of lemonade in her hand, but unfortunately she's not coming to offer wifely affection. She explains he's needed to track a walker back to wherever it came from. He's a little irritated she apparently signed him up for the task without first asking if he was interested. "Was gonna do this 'n then clean fish for a couple hours for Garland's time," he grumbles.

"The tracking will count as hours. Lots of hours. In fact, you'll probably knock out the rest of your twenty for the week and then some."

That might mean he could have two full days to work on the cabin when they get back. "A'ight, but I wanna be back by Friday. Dante's got the day off. Gonna help me lay logs. So no more than one overnight."

Carol puts a hand on the small of his back and smiles. "Thank you, Pookie."

"Ask next time 'fore ya volunteer me though, huh?"

"Sorry. I assumed you'd want to."

Daryl finishes stirring his mixture and pushes the lid back down on the tub. "Ya know, this town's pretty good at runnin' itself. Don't need us to survive. We could just...live here. Work. Get paid. We ain't always got to be the ones responsible for shit."

"I guess taking on a certain amount of responsibility gives me a sense of a purpose."

"A'ight. But buildin' this cabin gives me a sense of purpose."

"You don't have to come. I'm sorry I presumed. Earl's sending another tracker, too, some former Border Patrol agent named Santiago. I don't know how good he is, but probably he could do the tracking, and I could find a third to round out the party."

"Nah. No. 'M goin'." Daryl doesn't particularly want her alone overnight with a couple of men he doesn't even know. Not that she can't hold her own, but...well, it makes him uneasy. And he also doesn't like the idea of being upstaged by some other tracker. "Said I'd go."

Carol smiles, and Daryl follows her back to the Barron cabin to pack for the expedition.


	76. Chapter 76

They grab their packs, weapons, and bedrolls, because now that it's already one in the afternoon, it's not likely they'll make it back the same day. The other deputy is already waiting for them by the west gate, leaned back casually against the solid door with his thumbs hooked into the pockets of his dark blue jeans and a black felt cowboy hat perched on his buzz cut hair. Though he's no longer clean shaven and now sports a dark black goatee, Daryl recognizes the man from the forest where Carol was stabbed. He didn't say much then. He simply followed Garland's orders and at one point he helped Carol onto the horse.

"I'm Santiago," says the deputy, drawing himself up to his full height, which is about two inches taller than Daryl.

"Daryl." Daryl shakes the man's outstretched hand and feels like his fingers are being seized in an unnecessarily strong grip.

"Earl tells me you can track, too?" Santiago says as he lets go.

"Mhmhm," Daryl murmurs and flexes his fingers.

Carol checks her rifle and shoulders it. "Earl says you used to be in the Border Patrol when this started?"

Santiago nods.

"How'd ya make it to Virginia?" Daryl asks. The Mexican border is over a thousand miles away, and Canada isn't exactly a hop, skip, and a jump either.

"I spent ten years on the border, but I was an instructor at the academy in South Carolina when it all started. My group and I headed toward D.C., hoping to find some government still intact. We gave up hope about the time we got to Petersburg, and we just established a camp." Carol unlocks the gate while Santiago continues, "We were near starving when Garland and his posse found us four years ago, back when he was still riding and looking for survivors. There were only five of us left alive by then." The gate creaks open and they all step through. "Garland took us back to Jamestown. I ended up joining his posse, finding more people in time." As Carol locks the gate behind them, Santiago concludes, "But we haven't _actively_ looked for camps in over two years. I'm glad we're doing this. Maybe we'll find survivors."

"Maybe find a threat," Daryl mutters. In the past three and a half years, Jamestown has been attacked twice by camps they didn't know about. The Hilltop had its own share of run-ins with unknown camps over the years, too.

"Either way," Carol says, "it's worth checking out."

They walk the fence line until they reach the pike from which Dante and Carol peeled the fresh walker. Santiago stoops to examine the grass, but Daryl is already walking along the tracks back to the woods.

Once they're inside the forest, Daryl begins plodding north east, but Santiago doesn't follow. Carol, who is trailing after Daryl, stops and looks back, so Daryl stops, too.

"How many cannibals did you take from the pikes this morning?" Santiago asks.

"Just two," Carol replies. "About twelve yards apart."

"And one was less fresh?"

"Four years dead at least," she says.

"I think you're following the older one's tracks," Santiago tells Daryl. "The fresh one came from this direction." He points north west. "And it must have been drawn to the fence in that section by some noise. They came at different times. The older one went that way eventually." He points in the direction of another section of pikes.

"That's where we peeled the older one from," Carol agrees.

Daryl retraces his steps to look at the earth near Santiago's feet and bristles. Damn if the man isn't right. These tracks show more treading on the shoe – they're a bit deeper, from a weightier, less desiccated body. Daryl just happened to see the other ones first. "Well she didn't tell me there was two walkers," he mutters.

"But you agree?" Santiago asks.

"Yeah. 'S go this way."

They switch directions and follow the sign through the forest, which intermittently vanishes and then reappears - sometimes it's a partial print in the earth, sometimes a cracked twig, sometimes disturbed leaves.

Santiago occasionally disagrees with Daryl on the direction, or vice versa, and four times they end up backtracking and restarting. Half of those times Daryl is right, and half it's Santiago, but after a little bickering, they always agree. Daryl grants the deputy his grudging respect.

Around four in the afternoon, they come out of the woods onto the dusty dirt shoulder of a country road, and the tracks suddenly multiply. Daryl studies the ground, trying to determine how many walkers, where the single fresh one split off, and why. "It was in a pack of at least ten," Santiago says.

"More like fourteen," Daryl mutters.

"Thus my _at least_ qualifier."

Daryl grunts.

"Uh…boys," Carol says. "I'm no tracker, but I think I've found the rest of the herd." She points across the roadway to the rippling lower branches of the pine trees on the other side. A walker lurches out from among the trees.

Daryl trains his bow, waits for the walker to set foot in the roadway, and then shoots it through the eye. The creature crumples to the asphalt just as another emerges from the trees. Carol sends an arrow sailing from her longbow into the second walker's neck, and it keeps staggering forward. She flings her arm back, grips an arrow from her quiver, reloads in one smooth motion, and then shoots the walker in the forehead. While Daryl sets his crossbow upright and holds it steady with his feet to pull back the string to reload, Santiago shoots a third walker with his rifle, which is muted by a silencer.

Ten more walkers spill out of the woods all at once. Daryl immediately takes down one and then struggles to reload. Meanwhile, Carol and Santiago take out two more each. Daryl shoots a fifth, but then decides his crossbow is too inefficient for the speed with which they're moving. He forgot how much faster fresh ones could lurch. He shoulders his crossbow and draws his knife as Carol sends her last two arrows flying. They hit a walker first in the shoulder and then the eye. Santiago fires, and one of the creatures crumples to the ground, leaving only three.

"Save yer bullets," Daryl insists as he charges forward, kicks back one walker, and stabs another. Carol is soon by his side and dispense with the walker he kicked while he turns on the third.

Catching his breath, Daryl surveys the tree line, waiting for more to emerge. Santiago strolls up beside him. Carol begins to collect her arrows and return them to her quiver. Daryl grabs his three as well, slurping them from the foreheads of the lightly decayed walkers, while Santiago, rifle poised, disappears through the tree line.

There are two muted shots – something of a pew rather than a bang - and Carol and Daryl take off running and burst into the woods, ready for a larger herd, but there are only two fallen walkers. They'd been feasting on a deer which is now dead and more than half eaten.

"That looks familiar," Carol says, nodding to the broken-off arrow in the deer's hide.

"Yeah," Daryl mutters. "'S mine. Got it in 'er hide this mornin'. Mitch got a shot in it, too, but we didn't hit the head or organs. Out ran us. Lost the tracks. Must of come this way 'ventually, drawn all those walkers back across the road." He sighs and looks over the ripped apart animal. "Finally got too weak to outrun 'em."

Santiago uses his hiking boot to push about one of the bodies. "I wonder why that one cannibal broke off from the rest of the pack and came toward Jamestown."

"Followin' a fox," Daryl says.

"Ah. I didn't see that. I'm not as well versed in my animal tracks as in the human ones. Or once-human ones."

"So how did they all die?" Carol squats down to roll over one of the bodies so that it's facing up. "I don't see any gunshot wounds or knife wounds in this one."

Daryl crouches down to examine the other. "Don't think they were killed. Must of just died. Flu, maybe. When'd that hit Jamestown?"

"September," Santiago says. "These can't have turned before March. I doubt it was the same flu that hit us."

"This shirt is stained," Carol says. "Possibly with vomit."

"Stomach virus then, maybe," Santiago says. "Or food poisoning. The flu we got was mostly respiratory."

"Hell yeah!" Daryl exclaims and slides a spare rifle handgun magazine out of a clip on the walker's belt. He swings his pack off his shoulder and unzips it. "'S full! Fifteen rounds."

"Pookie, I'm sorry," Carol says as he drops the magazine in his pack, "but we don't get to keep what we find. It all goes into inventory. We're on the clock."

"Pookie?" Santiago asks.

Daryl stands and glowers. "Got somethin' to say 'bout it?"

Santiago smiles. "No, but I've got plenty of _questions_ about it." He shrugs. "Of course, my wife used to call me pollito."

"Little chicken?"

"It was a common endearment where she was from. I hated it. What I wouldn't give to hear it again, though. What did you find, Carol?"

"Two spare handgun magazines that look full. And he's still got the gun in his holster. A Sig Saure P226." She slides it out, drops the magazine, and then racks back the slide to expel the bullet in the chamber. "Could use a cleaning." She picks up the bullet from the forest floor and slides the gun, magazines, and bullets in her backpack.

"Whatever it was, it must have killed quickly," Santiago says. "You'd think they'd take their guns off if they were laid up in bed for a while."

"Maybe not," Daryl says, "if they wanted to be on guard 'gainst people dyin' 'n turnin'."

They go to search the rest of the bodies and find most of them unarmed except for knifes, though they do recover one more handgun, three handgun magazines full of bullets, and about a half dozen stray rifle bullets in one walker's pants pockets.

"I miss the day when the posse got a sixth of everything we found scouting," Santiago says. "Maybe we can make this an _off_ -the-clock trip? Give up the hours but take the ammo?"

"It's probably not a good idea for deputies to break the rules," Carol suggests.

"We wouldn't be breaking them, exactly," Santiago reasons. "We'd have found a _loophole_. But you're right. We should set a good example. Besides, keeping the communal storehouses full this past year helped keep us alive through a rough winter and a bad raid." He shakes his head. "It's just a shame to think that if I had found this while out on a private scavenging trip, I could be buying all the single ladies drinks tomorrow night."

"All three of 'em?" Daryl grunts as he zips up his backpack and swings it on his shoulder.

"There's a few more than that. Four of your Kingdom ladies don't have steady boyfriends yet. Neither does Inola. And Candy…well…she's always willing to take on another boyfriend, but I prefer to avoid that trainwreck."

"Madam Linda doesn't have a boyfriend," Carol tells him with a dead pan expression.

Santiago rolls his eyes. "She's a little beyond my age range."

"What's fifteen years in the end times?" Carol asks.

"Do I look _fifty_ to you?"

"Forty-eight?" Carol guesses.

"I'm thirty-nine!"

Daryl snorts and heads back to the dirt shoulder on the other side of the road to figure out which way the small herd came from before it lurched after and caught the weakening, slowing deer. Soon enough, Carol and Santiago are trailing him along the roadway.

"Do I _really_ look fifty to you?" Santiago asks. "I mean, I know I have a _little_ gray in my beard, and around the temples…" He lifts his cowboy hat to scratch at his tightly cut, slightly graying black hair. "But…really?"

"Well, you said you worked for the Border Patrol for ten years," Carol says. "And then you were an instructor for a while. And it's been eight years since the collapse. So I thought that would make you older."

"You don't need a college degree for Border Patrol. I started when I was nineteen. And I wasn't an instructor for long." He sighs. "So I guess this means I shouldn't ask out that pretty twenty-one year-old from your Kingdom?"

"I think Anika is dating Inola's brother."

Daryl largely ignores the exchange and focuses on the tracks.

"I didn't mean Anika," Santiago says. "The other one. Kelly."

"She's in her mid-twenties," Carol replies.

"So you're saying I _do_ have a chance?"

Carol laughs. "I'm surprised you haven't asked me to be on the trade team to Oceanside yet."

"Well, you wouldn't be in charge of those choices. The council would. If it even happens."

"I know, but because I'm planning to run for council, everyone keeps asking me before they sign my petition if I'll put them on the trade team, as if I had any power to do so."

"You're running?" Santiago asks. "Really? Want me to sign your petition?"

"Would you?"

Daryl keeps walking while Carol pauses to pull out the pencil and the paper she keeps folded in her front shirt pocket.

"Number twenty-three. What do you know. That's my lucky number," Santiago says as he signs. "Seven signatures to go."

Daryl stops and looks back. "Y'all comin', or are ya just gonna gab all day?"

Santiago hands back the petition, which Carol folds and slides in her front pocket.

"Sorry, Pookie," Santiago says. "I was just trying to help out your wife."

Daryl growls and narrows his eyes but turns and walks on. Carol and Santiago catch up to him.

In about a mile, the tracks disappear down a gravel side road that sports a brown sign reading simply: "Church." The arrow points west, and the trio turns its footsteps toward the distant steeple.


	77. Chapter 77

Gravel crunches beneath Carol's boots. She sets an arrow in her bow though she doesn't pull back yet. She just wants to be ready because there's a chewed-over body in the road not far from the church. Daryl's eyes scour in every direction, while Santiago, rifle poised, comes to a stop by the body and crouches down. He picks something up from the road and stands. "9 mm shell casing."

"He was shot?" Carol asks.

"Looks like," replies Santiago as he slips the casing into his pocket. They collect spent shells for reloading whenever they find them.

Daryl motions with the toe of his boot to the unsnapped, empty holster on the dead man's belt. "With his own gun."

Carol glances up and down the gravel road and in its grassy shoulders but sees no sign of a dropped gun. Whoever shot this man took the gun with him. "Murdered?" she asks. "And left for the walkers?"

"Maybe it was preemptive," Santiago suggests. "Maybe he had _just_ died and they wanted to keep him from rebirthing. He's so mangled I can't tell where he was shot."

"Body don't look that old," Daryl observes. "Them walkers must of been even fresher than we thought. Two weeks turned, maybe, not two months."

Daryl walks ahead of them to the other side of the three wooden stairs leading up to the church's sanctuary. The chapel is an old, white wood structure with steeple and bell tower, but there's a covered, wood walkway stretching from its right side to a larger brick building. Behind that is a large, gravel parking lot, empty of cars. Daryl points up at the chipped white walls of the chapel to some red-brown words. "Hey, Look."

Carol and Santiago join him. The words drip – _Williamsburg_. _Baby alive._

"Holy shit. I think they wrote it in that man's blood," Santiago says.

Carol's not fazed by that. Maggie wrote her signs to Glenn in blood. "They were expecting someone to return and find the scene," she says. "Maybe a couple of them were out scavenging when everyone turned."

"'N there's a baby?" Daryl asks.

"Apparently." Carol heads toward the chapel stairs. Daryl and Santiago flank her.

The wooden front door of the chapel is latched shut from the outside by a large black iron bolt that has been slightly bent, probably from the walkers throwing themselves against the door from the inside. One of the windows to the right of the front door has been completely shattered, and bits of dried black blood and flesh dangle from the jagged pieces.

"They were locked inside," Carol says. "Maybe before they turned. It looks like the walkers finally busted through a window and crawled out."

"Ate that dead man 'fore going out toward the road," Daryl agrees.

Santiago unlatches the bolt and swings open the door. Carol and Daryl enter side by side and clear in different directions as the hazy rays of the early evening sun filter through the stain glassed windows painting the pews in colored lights. The sanctuary is bigger than it appeared to be from the outside, extending about twenty rows of pews in two columns on either side of the aisle – enough to seat at least three hundred people – and there are additional folding chairs stacked in the back. Several have been toppled by the bumbling walkers.

They all come to a stop at the altar. "What the hell is this?" Santiago points to the eight-ounce water glasses that are scattered over the altar floor, as if they were dropped there by people kneeling at the altar and then later kicked around by the stumbling walkers. Some of the glasses are cracked, some still intact. There's a splotch on the red carpet of the altar, indicating a spill, and the glasses appear to have a ring of dried dark red liquid around the bottom. One empty wine bottle still stands on a table on the altar, and a second appears to have been knocked over onto the floor.

"Fuckin' Jonestown in here," Daryl mutters.

"You think they drank the kool aid?" Santiago asks.

"Poisoned wine anyhow. 'Cept the one got shot outside, 'n whoever wrote that sign."

"Maybe that man outside was the leader," Carol suggests. "Whoever had the baby – she ran out of the back of the church instead of drinking. He gave chase, and she wrestled his gun from him and shot him."

Daryl shakes his head. "Ain't no way a woman holdin' onto a baby gonna get the drop on a man and get his gun from 'em."

"Maybe she didn't have the baby with her at the time," Carol says. "Or maybe she feigned compliance in order to buy time to grab his gun. Maybe she _handed_ him the baby."

"Maybe the baby was his," Santiago says. "Maybe the baby had blond hair and hazel eyes. Maybe the baby weighed nine pound eight ounces. We don't know. We don't know _anything_. We're speculating out of our asses. I wish Garland was here. He's the detective."

"Garland's a new father," Carol replies. "He's not leaving the gates for a while. Not for something like this, anyway." He'd leave if it meant defending the town. Carol counts thirteen glasses on their sides on the altar floor. "We found eleven fresh walkers," she thinks out loud, "plus the man in the road, and whoever escaped with the baby. Thirteen glasses. I think they were _all_ supposed to drink, and only one escaped. Two, if you count the baby."

"'S check out the brick buildin'." Daryl begins walking back through the chapel, and Carol and Santiago follow.

There's a garden box on the side of the building, and it looks like it's been planted within the last few months. Some green has recently sprouted – probably in the week or two _after_ the group drank the wine.

The door to the brick building is unlocked. There are lots of windows, so they can see in the hazy light well enough to sweep inside the fellowship hall, kitchen, four classrooms, and church nursery. It's clear people have been living there, based on the sleeping bags in the classrooms. One of the cribs in the nursery has been neatly made-up, the tiny comforter carefully tucked in over the mattress and smoothed out. A stuffed rabbit sits untouched in the corner.

"Counted twelve sleepin' bags," Daryl mutters.

"The mother must have taken hers," Carol says.

"She didn't take the bunny, though?" Santiago asks skeptically. "To comfort the baby? My son wouldn't go _anywhere_ without his lovey when he was a baby."

"That thing don't look loved on." Daryl snatches up the bunny. "Don't even look touched." He swings his pack to his side to tuck the bunny inside.

"Why are you taking _that_?" Santiago asks.

"For m' godson."

"If you're bringing VanDaryl something," Carol cautious him, "you should get Gary something, too."

Daryl scans the book shelves of toys against the wall. They're filled with teething rings, stacking toys with large plastic circles, shape sorters, and other toys for toddlers. "'S all too young for 'em." But then he spies a Nerf, foam football and struts over and snatches it up.

Later, in the kitchen on one of the counters, Carol finds a small funnel and a closed vial of powder. "Look at this," she tells Daryl and Santiago. "I think he mixed this powder with the wine. It could be ricin, though I don't know how he would have made it unless they had castor beans. But ricin causes respiratory or organ failure, followed by death, within mere hours."

Santiago looks at Carol warily. "Please tell me you know this because you used to be a murder mystery author."

"I wrote a detective short story once," Carol lies. Actually, after a particularly bad beating by Ed, she researched the best ways to poison someone without getting caught. In the end, though, she decided that (1) murder is wrong, (2) she'd probably get caught and Sophia would be without a mother, and (3) Ed was sorry for what he did. Really sorry. And he was going to do be a better husband in the future, just like he promised.

Carol cautiously sets the vial back down on the counter.

Daryl has wandered off and is looking at a spiral notebook. "They was runnin' out of food." Carol joins him and looks down at the inventory, which shows only three gallons of fresh water and a little bit of jerky and jarred food left – enough to feed fourteen people for one day at most.

"Williamsburg is nearby, isn't it?" she asks Santiago. Carol's pretty sure the Kingdom refugees passed signs for it on their way here, but they took a less eastern route and didn't go through it.

"Eight miles northeast of Jamestown," he answers. "The posse has been there to scavenge twice. Four and a half years ago, there was no sign of living people. But a little under two years ago, when we went back, we found sings of a camp in the historic area. A group had moved in there at some point. But then the camp must have been overrun by a drove of cannibals. We found a lot of chewed over bodies and trampled gardens, and we looted what was left behind in the cellars. We assumed that whole camp was wiped out, but maybe thirteen of those people escaped, and that's who came down here to this church."

"Don't seem like they've lived here two years," Daryl says. "Ain't much planted."

"They probably wandered before settling here, maybe tried to make camp somewhere else for a while," Santiago replies. "And whoever wrote that sign went back to Williamsburg. Maybe she went back hoping there'd still be jarred food in their root cellars. Except…we took all that."

"If there's a baby, I really think we should check it out," Carols says.

Santiago pushes his hat up on his forehead and rests his hands on his hips. "The sun is setting soon. We should head back to Jamestown, stay the night, set out in the morning with the horses. Eight miles and back is a long way on foot, and Williamsburg itself is nine square miles. But we'll need the council's approval to take the horses."

"We have to pay to use our own damn horses?" Daryl asks.

"No, not pay...but it's got to be officially approved and scheduled."

Carol glances at Daryl. "I want to do this, but I understand if you don't. I'm sorry I presumed before."

"Go with ya if ya can wait two days," he replies. "Wanna work on that cabin tomorrow and the next day while Dante's off."

"There's a baby. I worry time is of the essence." But she also really wants Daryl by her side for this.

"Woman left here 'bout two weeks ago," Daryl reminds her. "Judgin' by that body. What's 'nother two days?"

"I suppose you're right," Carol agrees, but all she can think of is Sophia, lost and alone in those woods.

The pained memory must show on her face, because Daryl says, "Hell, damn cabin can wait. I'll go."

They look to see if there's any food left in the kitchen cabinets, because the inventory indicates some, but the woman must have taken it.

"Can't believe some of 'em was armed 'n didin't fight back," Daryl says. "Just drank the damn poison."

"Cowards," Santiago mutters. "They thought they were going to starve, and so they took the easy way out."

"At least that mother got away with fourteen days' worth of food and water," Carol says. "If that inventory is accurate and they didn't just eat it all before they killed themselves. That will keep her producing milk for the baby. Let's hope that body in the road really is only two weeks old."

Daryl nods, and together the trio sets out on foot back to Jamestown.


	78. Chapter 78

The sun has set when they return to the gates of Jamestown. Carol and Daryl drop their packs in their bedroom and return to the kitchen nook, where leftovers from the Barron family supper await them. "We weren't sure if you'd be back tonight for dinner, so we made you some just in case," Shannon explains as she rocks VanDaryl in the rocking chair and breast feeds him beneath a light blanket.

"Hell's my dog?" Daryl asks suddenly, his heart thudding against the cage of his chest when he doesn't see the animal in his usual spot on the deer skin rug. He'd thought of taking Dog tracking today, but the boy had already worked extra hard on the morning hunt and needed an afternoon nap.

"He's on barn duty tonight," Garland tells him. "We had a bit of a rat problem. The cats don't quite have it under control."

Stomachs growling, Daryl and Carol wolf down the cold leftovers. A PJ-clad Gary snuggles in his father's lap in the armchair. When Garland finishes reading a picture book to the boy, he turns halfway back in the armchair to ask Carol and Daryl what they found.

"Tell ya when the boy's asleep," Daryl says. "Want me to tuck 'em in?"

"Sure," Garland answers.

Daryl goes to the pack he dropped in his bedroom and comes back with the Nerf football he snagged from the church nursery. "Hey, Gare, got ya soemthin'."

"Baseball!" Gary yells as he slides out of his father's lap, abandoning the book.

"'S a football."

Gary grabs the football and hugs it like a stuffed animal.

Daryl puts a hand on Gary's back and ushers him to his parents' cramped bedroom, where he gets him tucked in under the covers of the trundle bed. "Weed!" Gary demands, the football cuddled to his chest. Daryl eases down onto the foot of the trundle and grabs a book that is wedged under the covers.

"This one okay?" Daryl asks, turning the book toward him.

"Bwon Bear, Bwon Bear what do you see?" Gary says. "I see a wed burd wookin at me!"

"Sounds like you should be reading it to me," Daryl tells him.

The boy is out before Daryl even finishes the book, and he eases quietly from the room. VanDaryl is no longer under the blanket and is instead snuggled sleeping against his mother's shoulder. "Got him a stuffed rabbit," Daryl says.

Shannon smiles. "I'm sure he'll love it. Would you transfer him to the crib? You never wake him up when you do it."

"Daryl's stealthy," Carol agrees as she slides down onto the couch and Daryl carefully takes the baby from Shannon and settles him in the crib by the bookcase.

"So?" Garland asks again when Daryl sits down next to Carol and slings an arm over the back of the couch behind her. "What did y'all find?"

When their story is told, Garland replies, "The council already has an early morning meeting scheduled. I'll propose that you be allowed to use the horses. You'll know by nine in the morning. But no matter how long it takes you, you can't earn more than eight hours toward rations."

"Tomorrow's m'day off anyhow," Daryl says. "Wasn't planning to earn no time. Donate them hours to ya."

"You don't know how much I appreciate your help. It's been…" He smiles across the room at Shannon. "Really nice having a little time at home."

Shannon smiles back.

Garland returns his attention to Daryl and Carol. "I'd suggest you take a fourth man and some extra ammo for safety. Williamsburg is a high traffic area when it comes to cannibals."

Shannon puts her feet up on the little wooden footstool before the rocking chair. "We might have another baby in Jamestown if they find this woman."

"Maybe," Garland agrees. "But we'll have one in seven months regardless. Ana's pregnant."

"I thought they weren't telling anyone," Carol says.

"Well, Earl's too proud to keep his mouth shut," Garland replies. "How do you know it was a woman who escaped with the baby?"

"Well, all of the walkers we found were male," Carol reasons. "If there's a baby, there's most likely a mother."

Garland drums on his knuckles with the fingers of his other hand. "How do we know _she_ didn't poison the wine?"

"What?" Carol asks.

"Oh, sounds like Sherlock's got a theory," Shannon teases. "Do tell."

"You're thinking she escaped a suicide pact," Garland says. "But maybe she's like a bear with a cub. They're about to be out of food. If she can kill them all, she'll have fourteen days of food to _herself_ , which will mean she keeps producing milk for her baby. Ricin is a largely tasteless poison. They may not have known what they were drinking before they started feeling it. Maybe they were having a party because they'd scavenged some wine, or maybe it was their version of Sunday communion. She poisoned the wine. One of them figures it out when she's not drinking and his organs begin to shut down. He makes a run for it. She grabs his gun as he flees, pursues, and shoots him. Then she locks the rest of the dying people in the chapel and leaves them to turn, while she takes all the food."

"Then why'd she leave a note?" Shannon asks.

"For her husband, who was out scavenging."

"Baby, that's absurd."

"Is it? People have done worse things to survive in this world. Maybe this woman is psychotic like Harold was."

"If she is," Carol says, "all the more reason to rescue that poor baby."

"Or maybe she didn't do it merely to survive," Garland says. "All those men and one woman…Perhaps they used her, and that was her revenge. Though I don't know why she would leave a note in that case. At any rate, you won't know what she is if you find her. So be cautious around her. And if you bring her back, make sure she's kept under guard until I can interview her."

"That's not your job anymore, baby," Shannon insists. "You've got enough responsibility as mayor."

"I do, which means I'm ultimately to blame if something goes wrong. I'm not leaving this one entirely to Earl. We have to be sure."

"Probably ain't even gonna find 'er," Daryl mutters.

"I hope you do." Shannon shakes her head. "For that poor baby's sake."

[*]

Carol spoons back into Daryl's embrace in bed. "Thank you for coming with me tomorrow."

"Mhmhm."

"I know you'd rather stay and work on the cabin."

"Seems important to ya. 'S just…'m worried. Worried how yer gonna feel if we don't find 'er."

"I know the possibility's slim. But I couldn't rest easy without at least _trying_."

He squeezes her and kisses the top of her head. "We're gonna try."

[*]

The council approves their request to continue the expedition on horseback, for a maximum of eight on-the-clock hours, with the understanding that they'll enter anything they scavenge into the communal storehouse. The council allows them to take extra ammo in case of an emergency, but demands that they return it to the storehouse if it isn't used.

While Carol goes to recruit Sarah as their fourth man for the mission, Daryl heads to the building site to tell Dante he won't be working today.

"Man, I was _really_ counting on that tobacco so I could have a night out at the tavern," Dante grumbles. "Inola's going to dinner there with Gunther tonight, and Adahy wants us to go out for drinks so he can keep an eye on his little sister, you know."

" _Adahy_ wants to keep an eye on her?" Daryl asks doubtfully.

Dante shrugs. "Tell you what. I've got nothing else to do today. I can get Adahy to help me lay logs, and we can get a bunch of layers done while you're gone. Give me your _whole_ week's tobacco rations, and I'll take half and give him half. Then I don't have to buy him drinks either."

Daryl sighs. He'd planned to get two days' work of help out of Dante with those rations, but it would be nice to come home to some progress, and he can't not pay Dante's helper. He fishes the tobacco out of his pocket – he was planning to give Dante an advance anyway – and hands the baggie over. "But y'all better get least five rows done. _All_ the way 'round."

"Five, easy," Dante tells him as he takes the baggie. He smirks. "Feels like a corner drug deal."

Daryl grunts.

[*]

It's ten in the morning when the set out. Dog isn't joining them because he's keeping the feed in the barn safe again tonight until Jamestown can catch all the rats. Sarah agrees to join the expedition at Carol's request, and she comes prepared with a full quiver of arrows for her longbow, a handgun, and a knife, and her long blonde hair restrained in a tight braid.

They take three horses. Daryl and Carol share Lancelot, while Sarah rides Guinevere, and Santiago, with his wooden Winchester rifle slung over his left shoulder, mounts one of Jamestown's mares. As they saunter from the parking lot, Daryl and Carol in the lead and Santiago and Sarah riding side by side behind, Carol leans back against Daryl's chest. He holds the reins, and she rests her hands on his knees for now. It's not as fun as riding a motorcycle with him, but there's a certain thrill in it. She loves the feel of his legs against hers, the musky scent of the man, the strength of his arms and the sureness of his grip on the reins as they ride through the open gates of Jamestown and begin their journey.


	79. Chapter 79

Horse hooves clatter on the crumbling asphalt of Colonial Parkway. Daryl guides the horse around the debris from a busted-out tire. From behind them, Santiago asks Sarah, "So, are you still dating the captain?"

"Yes," she answers.

"Of course you are. Who doesn't want to date a rich man?"

"A man doesn't have to be rich to be _charming_ ," Sarah replies.

"Look, I'm sorry I tried for sex on the first date. I didn't know that would be a deal breaker for you, or I never would have. You couldn't give me a second chance?"

"Hell is this?" Daryl mutters to Carol. "Soap opera hour?"

"It's a policy I have," Sarah tells Santiago. "Any man who expects sex on the first date goes to the bottom of the list."

"I wasn't _expecting_ it. I was _asking_ for it. I was perfectly happy to see you again without it."

"Fine, it's my policy that anyone who _asks_ for it goes – "

"- that's a ridiculous policy," Santiago interruptus. "You could be missing out on some really great guys."

"David is pretty great. Handsome. Intelligent. Charming."

"Rich and powerful," Santiago says. "The total package. Ever wonder why he's the total package but still doesn't have a wife? I mean, even Daryl has a wife."

Daryl turns in his saddle. "The fuck?"

"No offense intended."

"How the hell did ya intend it, then?" Daryl growls.

Carol pats his leg affectionately. Daryl grunts, turns forward, and spurs Lancelot ahead of the other two, but they soon catch up and end up riding on either side of Daryl and Carol and talking over them.

"What are you implying?" Sarah asks.

"It's just," Santiago answers, "David was at Jamestown since almost the start, and he's never married anyone in all that time."

"Neither have _you_ ," Sarah replies.

Santiago smirks. "Yes, but I'm not _charming_ , am I?"

Carol can't help but chuckle.

"Besides, I _have_ been married," Santiago replies. "I was married for thirteen years in the old world."

"That long?" Carol asks. "I thought you said you were only thirty-nine."

"She was my high school sweetheart," Santiago explains. "We got married right after graduation."

"Did you knock her up?" Sarah asks.

"Well that's a crude way of putting it," Santiago replies. "What a thing for a knight and a _lady_ to say."

Sarah smirks. "I'll take that for a yes."

"That's not the _only_ reason we got married. We were going to anyway."

"How did you manage to support yourselves that young?" Sarah asks.

"I became a cop as soon as I turned eighteen. Then I joined the Border Patrol after I got my year of experience. Decent pay. Good benefits. Regular small raises. And I was lucky enough to get stationed in Brownsville, which was forty miles from our hometown. Our family helped. When I got the position teaching at the academy, my wife stayed behind."

"She divorced you?" Sarah asks.

"No. She just stayed behind. She didn't want to make our son change schools when I was only going to be teaching for three years and then moving back to Brownsville. They came and stayed with me during summer and spring break, and I went home for Christmas."

Carol pats Lancelot when the stallion gets distracted by something in the road. The horse lifts its head and presses on. "So," she asks, "when it started, you were in South Carolina and your family was in Texas?"

"Yes."

"We know a couple of people from Texas," Carol says, "in the Alliance. Rosita and Eugene. They came from around…"

Daryl fills in the blank for her: "Houston."

"Really?" Santiago asks. "Why did they go all the way to Virginia? That's over a thousand miles!"

"Tryin' to get to D.C.," Daryl tells him. "Thought they had a cure." It's the simplest way to say it.

"Shit," Santiago mutters. "I didn't think that was possible, for anyone to make it alive that far. It's why I didn't go back to Texas to try to find my family. That and…well, I assumed they were already dead." He turns his attention back to Sarah. "My point was David's _never_ been married. Not even in the old world."

"And you think that makes him deficient somehow?" Sarah asks.

"I think it's suspect," Santiago answers.

"What's _suspicious_ about it?" Sarah asks. "Just come out and say what you're suggesting why don't you?"

"I'm saying the charming, handsome, affable Captain Cummins might be deep in the closet."

Carol suddenly wonders if maybe _Captain Cummins_ is the "sailor" Mitch has been having sex with, rather than Harry. But it _must_ be Harry, because Harry actually _is_ a mere "sailor," and Mitch coolly made that snide comment to Harry about being _straight as an arrow_. Of course, Captain Cummins is a lot closer to Mitch's age. "Maybe the captain just hasn't found the right woman yet," Carol suggests. "That was your problem, wasn't it, P – " She almost says Pookie again, in front of everyone, but she knows he hates it. "Daryl?"

"Mhmh. Sure. Yeah. 'S whole _line_ of women wantin' to marry me, but I's just waitin' for the right one."

He's being self-deprecating, but there's some truth to that statement. He probably _could_ have married a woman from the Alliance if he had wanted to. Who would turn down a capable hunter and a solider, a man who was clearly respected by all four communities, in a world like this? But Daryl simply wasn't interested in a relationship. He was waiting. _For her_. Carol squeezes his knee.

" _I've_ never been married," Sarah says. "Does that make _me_ suspect?"

"You're thirty," Santiago replies. "And when the Great Sickness broke, you were only _twenty-two._ But the captain's forty-two. _"_

"Not everyone wants to get married, you know," Sarah says.

"Do you?" Santiago asks.

"Someday probably."

"Then I'll I'm saying is…Captain Cummins may be a waste of your time."

"Trust me, he's _not_ a waste of my time, whether or not things turn serious. It's very enjoyable dating him."

"Enjoyable," Santiago echoes. "Have you two had sex yet?"

"That's none of your damn business!" Sarah exclaims.

Santiago smirks. "I'll take that for a no."

"He's a _gentleman_ ," Sarah insists. "You know, some people choose not to have sex until they get married."

Santiago snorts. "Some people, yes. Are you suggesting the captain is a 42-year-old virgin?"

"I'm suggesting he doesn't rush into things."

"You believe that, Daryl?" Santiago asks. "You believe a man will date a woman for five weeks without trying to bed her?"

Carol smiles. It was seven years before Daryl _bedded_ her. Of course, they were far from dating those seven years. From the time they first kissed to the time they had sex was about two weeks.

"Dunno," Daryl mutters. "Ain't none of my damn business. Ain't none of yers, either."

"Thank you, Daryl," Sarah says.

"I was just trying to be helpful," Santiago insists. "I would hate for you to get your heart broken." He kicks his mare and the horse trots up to take the lead as they turn right onto Jamestown Road and pass a sign reading _Williamsburg….7 miles_.

[*]

The horses clod over a toppled wooden fence. Daryl is careful to guide Lancelot around the protruding nails. "Weak defenses," he mutters.

"That's why they got overrun," Santiago agrees. "It just took the weight of the drove."

They pass a rotting ticket booth at the entrance to the historic area. "The navy men cleared this area of walkers the first time they scavenged here, back when Jamestown had more firepower. When the posse came back two and half years later, we just found the remains of this camp. We're guessing they were here at least a year and a half before they got overrun. We were scavenging mostly west in those days. Never saw them."

"Foolish to build something and not protect it better," Carol says.

"Got company," warns Daryl, and he hands over the reins to Carol so he can slides his crossbow from his back and shoot one of the eight walkers stumbling around a corner toward them.

Sarah shoots next, reloads her longbow, and shoots again, while Santiago charges forward on his horse and thrusts his rifle's bayonet into the eye of a fourth walker.

Daryl swings his crossbow on his back, vaults off the horse, and, drawing his knife, runs forward to stab a fifth walker while Sarah shoots the sixth. A decaying hand closes in on Daryl's lower arm and then suddenly releases, its crusty flesh sliding from his skin like a callus. The creature flops to the ground with Carol's arrow in its head. Daryl breathes a sigh of relief. To his left, the eighth walker also collapses, and the arrow in its head snaps when it crashes to the ground.

Daryl gathers all of the spent arrows that are still usable and returns them to the women.

"We've got more coming around the corner!" Santiago warns.

"Thought ya said the drove moved on?" Daryl mutters as he reloads his crossbow with a blood-soaked arrow.

"It did. Most of it. But there were stragglers. Still are, apparently." Santiago kicks his horse, lowers his bayonet, and charges forward to drive it through the brain of the nearest creature. He rips upward to free the bayonet, tearing the top of the rotting walker's head off with it, and circles back to the others, who open fire with bows.

Daryl takes down two while each of the women, able to reload faster, take down three apiece. The bodies lay scattered on the streets. Daryl, who is on foot, raises a hand to indicate the group should remain silent while he listens for the sound of more, but only the blue birds can be heard chirping in the trees that line the street. "Think we're good for now."

"That crossbow's not very efficient," Santiago observes. "It's not exactly speedy reloading."

"Like yer bayonet's any better?" Daryl mutters. Santiago's got to get close with that thing, which makes his horse vulnerable to nearby walkers.

"Well, I _do_ have the backup of firepower if I need it. I'm just trying not to waste ammo. Why don't you take up the longbow like these lovely ladies?"

"'Cause m' a crossbow man. 'N I got backup firepower, too. Got m' handgun if I need it. 'N m' knives." Carol's also brought a rifle, which is behind the saddle.

"Well, we _all_ have knives," Santiago insists.

"Like this 'un?" Daryl draws his knife and turns the blade for Santiago to admire.

"Boys," Carol says. "Can we table the pissing match until we're done with our mission?"

Daryl grunts and slides his knife back into its sheath. He walks alongside Carol's horse now, his crossbow held loosely in one hand, but cocked and loaded in expectation of more walkers.

"The camp that was here was using this apothecary." Santiago nods to a small brick shop as he rides past it. "They pounded and mixed and bottled natural medicines there. We salvaged a few, but it looked like someone had quickly cleared out a bunch of them before running from the drove."

"That might be where that ricin came from," Carol suggests. "If they were also making poison for rat control."

They ride on past a bakery and a tavern. "They'd been using that bakery," Santiago explains. "It has wood-fired stone ovens."

They pass a silversmith next, and then a grocer's shop, the printing and post office, and the cooper. "If they'd just secured this place better," Carol observes, "it would have made a great camp. It's already set up to operate without power."

"The Navy considered using it, at the start, but they chose Jamestown instead," Santiago replies. "It was easier to fence in, and it was on the water for fishing. And it had those ships." He points to the courthouse. "People were living in there. There are a lot of cannibals bumping around in there now."

As Daryl walks alongside Carol's horse, he can hear the muted gnashing and growling drifitng from the courthouse. The lower windows, some of which are cracked and smashed, have been boarded up securely from the inside.

"Garland thinks they were afraid to venture out because of the drove," Santiago continues. "They boarded it up and waited for the drove to pass, but instead they eventually got surrounded. They must have started to die and turn in there at some point. Dehydration, lack of sanitation...who knows."

They pass four dead walkers in the street and Daryl walks over to stoop down and examine them. "Been shot."

"Do you think they were shot by that woman?" Carol asks. "We know she took at least one handgun. Maybe even a rifle."

The woman may have been able to snag some more weapons before she locked the dead and turning men in the church. A couple of the walkers they slew had spare magazines clipped to their belts, but no handguns, and one had rifle bullets in its pockets.

"Nah. Look like they been dead a long while."

"The posse shot a lot of cannibals last time we were here," Santiago says. "They're probably ones we killed."

Daryl stands and walks between the other fallen walkers before returning to the group.

They pass the shoemaker and the lumber house next, and Daryl shoots a walker moving in their direction from the church. He recovers his arrow and wipes it clean with the rag that dangles from his back pocket before reloading his crossbow.

Next they pass a saddlemaker, and Santiago says, "We found three horses picked over by cannibals. It's possible they had more and some of them escaped on horseback."

"No sign of horses at that church," Daryl says.

"Let's go around the corner here and check out the garden," Santiago suggests. "It was trampled down by the drove last time we were here, but some growth may have resprouted from scraps since then. It might be one of the places she goes to look for food."

They dismount on the edge of the colonial garden, and Sarah stays near the horses to keep them from wandering. Weeds sprawl across the earth, but in the midst of their clawing grasp there sprouts a brighter green. Carol kneels and digs her fingers into the dirt to pluck out the root vegetable – a dirt-coated carrot. "The carrots have regrown. Onions, too, it looks like. Not much else."

Daryl points to holes in the earth. "Looks like someone dug some up recently." He plods through the overgrowth for a couple yards and calls, "Two walkers been shot here. Y'all shoot any in the garden?"

"I don't know," Santiago says. "Not that I saw or knew of, but we split up at one point."

"Don't look like they've been lying her over a year. Look recent. She was here."

The weeds ripple as Santiago walks through them to study the sign with Daryl.

Carol joins them, asking, "Did she leave tracks?"

Daryl swings a finger across a bare row of earth between the clawing green. "Yep. Grounds got some markin'. Recent, too."

"Do you think she's been living here the past few days?" Carol asks. "Alone with a baby, in the midst of all these stray walkers?"

"Maybe," Daryl mutters.

Carol looks back toward the horses. Lancelot has begun to tear hungrily at the plants. She calls to Sarah, "Will you stay and guard the horses while we follow the trail?"

Sarah nods.

"I'll stay with her," Santiago volunteers. "No one should be alone with all these walkers around. I mean…if you think you've got this, Daryl?"

" _'Course_ I got it."

"Holler if you need help," Santiago says. "Or fire a shot so we can hear it."

"You do the same," Carol tells him.

Santiago makes his way back through the overgrown garden to Sarah and the horses.

As they walk along the dirt, Daryl stoops intermittently to examine the ground. Sometimes he touches the dirt with a fingertip and pushes in. Carol has no idea what he's doing. "What's that tell you?"

Daryl stands and walks on, too immersed in his tracking to hear her, but when they get to the edge of the garden, he says, "Don't think we're followin' a woman."

"What do you mean?"

"Way he's walkin'….these tracks? They belong to a man."

Daryl presses on, puzzling over his recent discovery, and Carol follows.


	80. Chapter 80

Carol and Daryl come out the backside of the colonial garden and spill onto Francis Street. They pass a sign for the African-American Religion Exhibit, and Daryl follows the trail of dead walkers down the street, one every several yards. "Looks like he was outrunnin' a group of 'em, stoppin' to shoot back every now and then." He turns up Henry Street, and Carol is reminded of her adopted son back in Oceanside. She wonders how Henry is doing, how her diaspora Kingdom people are doing – if they've settled well in those three camps.

They walk by an information booth, shops, and the Merchant's Square. Daryl halts at the intersection of Henry and Prince George Street. He walks to the left for a while and stops so suddenly that Carol, who is following, almost runs into his back. "Wrong way," he mutters and turns around.

As they turn, a walker nears. Carol shoots the lurching creature and jogs to recover her arrow. When she rejoins Daryl, he's striding with purpose toward an overgrown swatch of land on Palace Green Street.

"Looks like it used to be a courtyard," Carol says. The old camp must have planted it with cown because the stalks are regrowing haphazardly on their own again.

"'N he plucked some," Daryl mutters. "'N then he had to shoot at the walkers when they caught up with 'em. Then he ran on. This way." He walks up Palace Green Street, alongside the half-wild, disturbed corn, toward the so-called Governor's Palace.

They enter the white iron gate and begin walking past an overgrown area that looks like it may have once been a shaped maze of bushes. Now, however, it's just one large clump of grown-together green. Their three quarters past the old maze and nearing the front steps of the great brick mansion when a shot rings out from one of the windows. The bullet lodges in the ground, kicking up dust less than a yard from Carol's feet.

Daryl pushes her immediately into the bushes and dives in after her, where they bury themselves in the green. Twigs, leaves, and brush tear at Carol's clothes and skin as she struggles to unshoulder her bow in the cramped overgrowth, and then something else claws at her – a walker, sliding the decaying tips of its fingers around her wrist.

She pushes it back in the dimness of the bushes and struggles to unsheathe her knife. Daryl circles around her, pushing back against a bush, and stabs it through the eye. As soon as his knife is out, another walker is upon them from behind. He turns, holds it back by the neck, and stabs, while Carol, her knife now free and her heart thudding the drumbeat of danger kills a third that has emerged from the right. Grasping hands – a half a dozen pairs – now slide through the bushes and tear at their shirts.

"Out!" Carol yells. "Out!" Who knows how many there are, and they can't see to fight. They could be bitten in an instant.

Carol's mother used to love the expression – _out of the frying pan and into the fire_ – and Carol thinks of it now as they burst from the overgrown maze back onto the pathway leading to the mansion, and in the line of fire from the window. A shot rings out, and Carol's certain one of them must be dead, but instead an emerging walker slumps to the ground beside her. The shooter has taken out that walker – and with perfect aim – which suggests he missed her intentionally the first time when the bullet landed by her foot.

Daryl stabs another walker pushing its way through the brush, and Carol takes care of the third. Each time a head pushes its way through the dark green overgrowth, one or the other of them stabs and rips back a knife, until the growling and gnashing stops and the bushes still.

Carol catches her breath as her eyes sweep the leaves and twisty twigs for any sign of movement. Daryl has turned and trained his crossbow up toward the window, out of which drifts the sound of a wailing baby.

Horse hooves thunder through the streets, and Santiago, following the sound of the gunfire, bursts through the open gate on his mare. He heels to a stop just behind them, drops the reins, and trains his rifle in the same direction Daryl is pointing his bow. The baby's cries grow louder through the open window. "I guess you found her," Santiago says. "Sarah's with the other two horses."

"I'm not trying to kill you!" comes a voice from the window – it's a man's voice, but with a hint of youth still in it. "I went looking for you. I've been waiting for you. Put your weapons on the ground and I'll give you back your baby."

"It's a _man_?" Santiago asks.

Daryl glances at Carol. "I think we should lower them," Carol says.

"Oh hell no," Santiago says. "I never give up my gun when someone else has one."

"He wasn't trying to shoot us," Carol insists. "It was a warning shot, and he took out that walker that was trying to grab me. If he wanted us dead, he would have just let it kill me."

"Maybe he didn't want _you_ dead," Santiago says pointedly. "Just your husband."

Carol knows what he's implying. "He didn't shoot Daryl when he had the chance either." She slides her bow off her shoulder and lays it on the ground.

Daryl holds up one hand, crouches, and sets his crossbow on the ground. Then he nods to Santiago.

"You damn well better be right about this," Santiago mutters as he dismounts and puts his rifle on the ground.

"Knives too!" comes the call from the window. "All on the ground, then walk to the bottom of the stairs."

Carol and Daryl shed their knives – the _visible_ ones – but they each have another beneath their pants legs. Santiago lays one knife on the ground. Guiding his mare by the reins, he follows Daryl and Carol cautiously toward the stairs, pushing his old, gray-brown cowboy hat up on his head and sighing.

The baby has quieted for now. As they stand at the bottom of the steps, the front door creaks open, and a young man – maybe nineteen, maybe twenty-two - stands there with a rifle on his shoulder and a baby cradled in his arms. The baby sucks on a pacifier. The young man's black hair is unruly. The thick, curly locks cover the light brown skin of his brow and half hide his deep brown eyes. The baby sucks hungrily on a pacifier.

The young man looks Carol over, as if he's puzzling about how she could be the mother at her age. Then his eyes fall on Santiago. He squints in confusion, like he's trying to recognize him.

"We saw your sign at the church off the old west highway," Santiago says. "Baby alive. Williamsburg. We came looking."

It must be the voice that clues the young man in, because he says, "Papá?"

Santiago blinks.

"Santiago Herrera?" the young man asks.

"Yes," Santiago replies slowly.

"It's me. Your son. Raul."

Santiago looks him up and down. "You're a _man_."

"It's been seven years," Raul replies.

"Eight," Santiago tells him.

"That long? How old am I now?"

Santiago shakes his head in disbelief, and his eyes begin to water. "You must be almost twenty-one." He swipes at his eyes with the back of his hand, and then they're filled with a painful hope that Carol's sure he must have buried years ago. But it flashes back suddenly and fiercely. "Your mother?"

"Dead."

The hope drains from Santiago's eyes as quickly as it rose. He steps back and sighs and hangs his head. But then he runs up the stairs and hugs his son to his chest, forgetting for a moment the baby, which sends up a plaintiff little cry.

[*]

The baby girl – who looks to be about six months - needs a wet nurse – Shannon's milk - so there's no time to hang about in Williamsburg. They talk as they ride. Carol wears the baby in a sling across her chest as she leans back against Daryl's chest. She smooths the baby's soft, light brown hair across its pale brow, above its bright blue eyes.

Raul's been feeding the baby water and juice with a bottle and supplies he got from the church's nursery, so she's not dehydrated, but she's likely malnourished. She hasn't had her mother's milk in two weeks.

At the entrance to historic Williamsburg, Raul dismounts from his father's horse and leaves a sign written in black coal – _Baby Alive. Jamestown_.

[*]

As they ride, Raul relates his story, starting in south Texas: "We made it to a government camp outside Houston. That's where Mom died. People were getting sick and turning. I left with a group that wanted to start its own camp, away from the disease. We settled on the gulf near New Orleans for a while. I'm glad you made me start going to the firing range with you when I was nine," he tells Santiago. "And took me fishing."

"Even though all you wanted to do was play video games?" Santiago asks with a smirk.

Raul nods. "But I didn't really learn to shoot until after the world collapsed. Abuela used to say necessity is the mother of invetnion. Remember?"

Santiago nods.

"Anyway," Raul continues, "that camp got raided by a gang. A lot of people were killed. Six of us escaped and moved on. We picked up a broadcast on the radio in Georgia, about some sanctuary. Terminus."

Daryl lets out a hard breath. His arms tense around Carol, and she can feel the painful memory floating off of him like steam.

"But as we got closer, the signs to it were crossed out. A big NO written above Sanctuary. That creeped us out, so we kept going north, toward D.C. We figured if there was stability left anywhere, it would be there, the seat of government, you know? Anyway, eventually, we found this camp in Williamsburg and they took us in. It was nice. We had gardens. Crops. A _life_ , you know? I even had a girlfriend. But then it got overrun by a flock of flesh eaters. I grabbed what I could and got out before it was too late. I found two other survivors, and for months we looked for others, but we didn't find anyone. We were just wandering. Scavenging. Fishing. Drinking from streams. Hunting. There was a woman. She gave up and committed suicide. The man got bit and I had to put him down. And then there was just me for a while."

"I can't believe for almost four years you were always within ten miles of me!" Santiago exclaims.

"Where does the baby come into all this?" Carol asks.

"I was alone for a long time," Raul answers. "I found this group, and because I was alone I joined them. Twelve men. They were kind of weird…they had these weird, cultish religious practices, but they had food. Some anyway. And lots of communion wine. But I made a mistake, falling in with them. After a week I just had the willies, and I told them I was leaving. They said I couldn't. They kept me under guard. Told me they'd kill me if I tried to escape. They made me their servant. Cleaning up, preparing meals. And the leader…" He grits his jaw. "Used me in other ways."

Santiago clutches the reins so tightly it seems he might rip through them.

"There was a week of that, and I was plotting ways to escape. And that's when they brought the baby…A group of them went hunting one day. No of them was really any good at hunting. They usually came back with nothing, but this day…they came back with two packs, some weapons, and this baby. They'd stolen it from the mother and father, and just left those people defenseless in the woods to die. And they said they were going to eat the baby."

Sarah gasps. Carol's stomach churns as she looks down at the little tyke sucking hungrily on the pacifier. Daryl's arms tighten around Carol.

"They were going to do their ritual communion with the wine and then kill it and fry it up. So I…" He swallows.

"Ya poisoned 'em all," Daryl says.

"How'd you know?"

"We saw the wine glasses," Carol explains. "The funnel. The vial of ricin."

"They had me uncork the wine and carry it and the glasses to the sanctuary. The guard left me alone in the kitchen - stood at the only exit - so I was able to use this little bit of ricin we'd mixed in the apothecary for rat poison. I'd kept it all this time, but I had no use for it yet. Hadn't even meant to take it really. I was trying to get medicines when I fled Williamsburg. But this seemed the ideal opportunity to get out. And I couldn't let them kill that baby."

"The leader realized what you were doing?" Carol asks.

"They drank in the sanctuary. I pretended to spill my cup. The leader went to the church nursery to get the baby, where they'd left it alone. They were going to kill it on the altar before cooking it. While he was gone, everyone started to die. I grabbed a handgun and a rifle and locked them inside before they could turn. I confronted the leader on the road outside the church when he returned with the baby. For whatever reason, the poison hadn't gotten to him yet. He tried to block himself with the baby so I had to shoot him in the foot first. When he dropped it, I got him in the head. Took his handgun, too. Took the baby. She was all right. A little shook up from the fall, but not hurt. I took the rest of the food. Then I left that note in case the parents could track and came looking for their child. I headed to Williamsburg. I thought maybe the flock of flesh eaters had moved on and there might still be some preserves stored in mason jars in our root cellars. But it looked like someone looted the whole place."

"That would be us," Santiago says. "A while back. There's plenty of food at Jamestown. And milk for the baby. Safety and peace. A whole community. You can have a life there."

"That's what I thought I could have in Williamsburg," Raul says dully. "And New Orleans. And Houston. That hope is _always_ a lie."

"Jamestown isn't a lie," Santiago assures him.

Raul glances at Sarah as she rides alongside them. "Is she your wife now?"

"No!" Sarah exclaims.

"Well you don't have to sound so repulsed," Santiago tells her.

The baby opens her mouth and the pacifier pops out. She wails. Carol gives the little tyke her finger, and its mouth closes around the tip, and she sucks. "What's her name?"

"How would I know?" Raul asks.

"What have you been calling her?"

"Sweetheart," he mutters. "I just…I've been calling her sweetheart."

"'S okay, sweetheart," Daryl whispers over Carol's shoulder to the baby. "Gonna get ya some milk."


	81. Chapter 81

Guards greet the returning search party at the gates of Jamestown. The riders dismount and the horses are stripped of their loot – what little ammo the group found, the handguns they took from the dead walkers, and some corn and carrots they plucked from the wild field and garden. It's not much, but it's something in return for the eight hours they earned toward rations today.

One of the guards looks down at the fussing baby in the sling across Carol's chest. "I need to get her to Shannon right away," Carol tells him. "To feed her."

"You need to take it to the infirmary first," the guard says. "Infectious diseases check. I'll bring the horse around to the front of the museum, so you can ride back faster after it's cleared."

Carol nods. The guards try to get a reluctant Raul to relinquish his guns but the young man looks at them with alarm and distrust. Rifle in hand, and his handgun still holstered, Raul backs away from them.

"It's just until the interview's over," Santiago assures him.

"I don't give up my weapons to _anyone_ anymore."

" _I'll_ still be armed," Santiago tells him. "You trust me, don't you?"

Raul continues to walk backwards, eyeing the guards. "I'll just leave then, if that's what you expect."

Santiago strides after him and tries to coax him back. Daryl and Carol don't see how the scene concludes, because they're in a hurry to get the baby fed. They pass the open door of the mayor's office on their way to the infirmary, and Garland looks up from the stack of papers when he hears the baby's cry. "You found it?"

"Found Santiago's boy, too," Daryl says.

"What?" Garland stands abruptly, and his desk chair rolls back. Carol fills him in quickly on their discovery, and he hastens to the front gate.

In the infirmary, Dr. Ahmad checks all the baby's vitals and examines an old scratch on her little arm as she cries. "She _looks_ barely six months," the doctor says, "but I'm guessing she's closer to seven. She's a bit malnourished, but not sick, infectious, or dehydrated. She's cleared for entry, but I'll come by the cabin and check on her tomorrow."

Lancelot is waiting for them outside the museum. Daryl and Carol mount the horse and thunder past the docks and field and into the settlement with the baby. Daryl slows the horse as they near the building site of the cabin. It looks like Dante and Adahy have managed to lay _six_ rows of logs all the way around, and they're getting ready to leave the site for the day. Daryl gives them a grateful nod, and Dante grins and says, "See, I told you we'd do at least five. I honor my bargains."

"Thanks," Daryl tells them.

"Is that the _baby_?" Dante asks. "You found it?"

"Takin' it to Shannon to feed. Ain't had milk in two weeks." And with that, Daryl spurs the horse on.

[*]

Shannon has just finished nursing VanDaryl and sighs at the expectation of immediately nursing another baby, but she settles her son into the crib and then settles herself into the rocking chair. She plops the baby girl unceremoniously onto her breast without a nursing blanket. Daryl looks away and mumbles, "Gonna return the horse to the stable." He whistles to Dog, who's enjoying a scratch behind his ears at Gary's hands. The dog whines at being summoned, licks Gary's face, and leaves the laughing boy tumbled onto the floor to follow Daryl to the barn.

"Poor little thing," Shannon murmurs as the baby nurses. "Ow! She's a biter!" She repositions the baby, winces, and lets it continue to nurse. It pulls back, chokes, and cries. Shannon reaches for the burp cloth over her shoulder, wipes its face, and plops it back onto her breast.

"She's just not used to getting any milk," Carol says as she begins to make dinner for the family in the kitchen nook. "She's had a lot of water and a bit of juice these past two weeks, and she's been sucking on a pacifier for comfort. She'll probably settle into it."

"Easy for you to say. You're not the cow. If I'm going to be nursing two babies now, going back to work is going to get trickier."

"Daryl and I can keep working your hours a little longer." Carol lights the wood stove. "We can probably switch the baby to cow's milk in six months."

Gary, still wiping his face of the departed dog's kiss, walks over and leans on the arm of the rocking chair to look at the baby. "I'm a big bwother two times?" he asks.

"Well, this one's not ours," Shannon tells him. "But we're going to keep her with us for a few months so I can nurse her until she's big and strong. Then she'll probably be with the nannies and the other kids in the orphanage."

Carol eases up in her chopping of a carrot to look across the room at the baby. There are too many kids in that orphanage already in her opinion. They're well treated, and they all have sponsors. They have teachers and nannies and role models, and they don't want for anything – but that's a lot of kids not to have a mother and father of their very own.

Maybe the concern shows in her eyes, because Shannon assures her, "She'll be fine. Those kids are like one big family, and I'm sure someone will sign up to sponsor her when she turns one. It's just five hours of work a week until they're three for sponsorship, ten hours until they're seven, and fifteen hours until they're thirteen." After that, the children work for their own rations. Shannon rocks and strokes the baby's fine brown hair. "She'll get a good education, too. She's lucky y'all found her."

When Carol has the soup simmering on the stove top, she tells Shannon about Santiago finding his son. Shannon finishes nursing and rights her dress before burping the baby, which, unaccustomed to the rich food, spits up a portion of it onto the burp cloth.

The front door shudders from a knock. Carol opens it to find Dante and Adahy standing on either end of a wooden crib. "I figured you'd need another crib," Dante says.

Carol waves them in, and, each holding an end of the crib, they situate it next to Van Daryl's before the window in the increasingly crowded living room where Shannon does her nursing at night. "When did you make that, Dante?" Shannon asks.

"A while ago, for Janice, but when she miscarried, I bought it back from her so she wouldn't have to keep looking at it. I figured I could sell it again eventually."

"Well how much do you want for it?" Shannon asks nervously. "We've been trying to save up our tobacco so we can work few – "

"- I don't want anything for it. She's an orphan. Consider it my contribution. I'd sponsor her myself, but…I'm already working to sponsor one."

Carol thanks him and goes to get the extra set of crib sheets Shannon has to make up the crib, into which Shannon lays the now sleeping baby girl. It turns its face toward VanDaryl, who stretches in his sleep.

"Maybe they'll get married one day," Adahy says.

"Let's not be arranging my son's marriage when he's just a baby," Shannon warns, and Adahy chuckles.

"Well," Dante says, "I've got Daryl's tobacco burning a hole in my pocket. We're going to go down to the tavern and pick up chicks."

Shannon snorts. "Pretty sure the only single chicks that are going to be there are Candy and the manager, and Inola. She'll be having dinner with Gunther tonight, won't she?"

"He's the first one to make it to two dates," Adahy says. "So Dante wants to keep an eye on him."

"That's not _true_. I just want to get a drink after all that work we did today."

Adahy chuckles.

"Has Santiago asked her out yet?" Shannon asks with a teasing smile. "I think they'd make a cute couple."

Dante glowers.

"Why _hasn't_ Santiago asked my sister out?" Adahy muses aloud. "Everyone else has." He slaps Dante affectionately on the shoulder. "Well, _almost_ everyone else."

"Come on. Let's drink." Dante heads for the door and Adahy follows. They wave to Carol on the way out, but the door doesn't shut. There's a murmur of voices, and then Garland comes in and shuts it behind them. He scratches his forehead beneath a thick brown curl of hair. "Quite the day, huh?" he asks Carol.

"I'll say," she replies as she returns to tend the soup. "Did Raul come inside?"

"Yes. He finally agreed to give up his weapons. Earl's finishing up the interview with him now." He nods to the pot. "Can you keep that warm for us for a while? And watch the kids? The Council needs to assemble to vote on probationary admission."

Carol nods and Shannon sighs as she rises from the rocking chair. "Guess I better go clean myself up."

"Just three more weeks of this, my love, and then you'll be done with the Council," Garland reminds her. "No more emergency evening meetings."

"But _you'll_ still be a busy mayor," Shannon says as she heads toward the open bedroom.

"You're assuming I'm running again," Garland says to her retreating back. "Maybe I'll just serve on the Council and keep my hat out of the ring."

Shannon laughs as she disappears into the bedroom.

[*]

Carol keeps the soup warm as long as she can, but the fire in the stove dies and its close to room temperature when Shannon and Garland get back and wolf it down. The baby girl awoke crying and Daryl is rocking her now as she sucks on his finger, but VanDaryl slumbers on while Gary plays connect floor with Carol on the deerskin rug.

"Please tell me she's not ready to nurse again," Shannon says.

"Have your dinner first," Carol replies. "Daryl's keeping her quiet for now."

After dinner, Garland checks on his baby boy in the crib and Daryl rises from the rocking chair to hand the baby girl to Shannon. She settles into the rocking chair to nurse and asks, "Does she have a name?"

"Sweetheart," Daryl answers as he slumps into the rocking chair.

"That's not a name," Shannon insists.

"'S _her_ name," he replies.

While Gary puts away Connect Four, Carol comes to sit at Daryl's feet. She shifts to hint she wants her shoulders rubbed, and he leans forward to do so, gently, and then a little rougher as he works into a knot.

Garland settles himself on the couch and Gary comes over, plops a pillow in his lap, and lies down.

"So what happened with Raul?" Carol asks.

"Earl said his sense of time was very sketchy, and there were some contradictions in his story about what happened to him. We were concerned about that, because he killed all those people, and we don't want to admit him if he's lying about _why_. We had the psychologist talk to him. He told us the disorientation on detail is to be expected. Raul's definitely suffered trauma."

"Ain't we all?" Daryl murmurs.

"True enough. It sounds like he was abused by that cult leader for the week he was imprisoned, and of course he'd been wandering completely alone for months before that. It's amazing he kept that baby alive in his psychological condition, but he's got a strong survival instinct. And he's a good shot, apparently?"

"We witnessed that," Carol agrees. Daryl has stopped rubbing, and she drapes an arm over his knee. "But you admitted him?"

"Conditionally," Garland replies. "Like we did all of you. He'll be a citizen in three months, if all goes well. Santiago has his own one-room cabin, so Raul will stay with him. We gave him his weapons back, since he'll have access to Santiago's anyway. I just hope he adjusts to settled life…to rules. He lived in community before. I think he will."

[*]

Even after all these years, Daryl still gets a thrill from slaying walkers. Their fight in the maze of bushes today sent the adrenaline pumping through his veins. And he gets thrill out of hunting, too – tracking and stalking and finally seizing his prey. But nothing compares to thrill that courses through every fiber of his being when Carol cums beneath him, as she does now – arching her back, moaning his name, spasming around him, and scratching her fingernails down over his back. If she does that enough times in their life together, maybe she'll completely cover the old scars with love's marks.

The last thin thread of Daryl's restraint unravels and he explodes with a groan as Carol coasts through the last of her orgasm. He throws himself, panting, on his back. "Damn." The sheets bunch together at the bottom of the beds, half raveled around his right ankle. The manual fan, which he wound before they started going at it, beats rhythmically above them, tickling their hot, sweat-slick bodies with moving air.

"That was _good_ ," Carol says.

"Well don't sound so surprised."

She chuckles, rolls toward him, and rests her head on his shoulder. "I just mean it was even better than usual. I wonder what made it so good tonight."

"Survivin'." Coming close to death and not meeting death always makes the sex sweeter, he thinks.

"And helping others to survive?" she asks. "I'm so glad we found that baby. And Raul."

"Mhmhm."

"Shannon and Garland aren't planning to keep her when she's weaned. Shannon said she'll probably go to the orphanage."

"Don't blame 'em. Got two already to provide for. Cabin's small."

Carol traces the sinews of his shoulder and begins trailing her finger down. "Those kids should have a mother and father of their own, don't you think?"

"Got a whole town of mothers 'n fathers, like Herschel does at the Hilltop."

Her tracing stills and she lays her palm flat on his abdomen. He senses that's not the answer she wanted him to give, but he doesn't know what she wanted him to say either.

"But she's just a baby," Carol whispers.

"Well, 'm gonna look for the mama and daddy tomorrow. Raul said they must have been campin' on the cult's huntin' grounds to the west of the church." In the aftermath of sex, he can already feel his eyelids drawing down like weights. But Carol still wants to talk, and the murmur of her voice sends them flying open again.

"And if you _don't_ find them?" Carol shifts and raises her head and searches him with her pretty blue eyes. They're soft in the flickering grow of the oil light.

"Gonna try," he reassures her, but it doesn't seem to be the assurance she wants. She just smiles a little sadly and nods. "Love ya," he says, because when he doesn't know what else to say, that usually seems to work.

"I love you, too, Pookie." She kisses his nose, closes her eyes, and settles back against his shoulder. Daryl reaches over and turns down the lamp.


	82. Chapter 82

_**A/N:**_ Sorry, I screwed up and somehow failed to upload this chapter when I thought I did. This was supposed to be chapter 82. Ooops. I guess the story probably seemed to jump a bit. So I've deleted the chapters and am now re-uploading the ones after it so everything is in order.

[*]

Carol awakens just before sunrise to the sound of Daryl dressing and rolls back to sleep after his lips press down on her forehead. It's closer to nine when she emerges from the bedroom and finds Shannon lying on the living room couch, half asleep, and nursing Van Daryl. Garland must have already taken Gary to preschool and headed off to work.

Sweetheart begins fussing in her crib, and Carol picks her up. The baby need to be given a real name, eventually, if they don't find the parents, but Sweetheart is what's fixed in Carol's mind for now, after hearing Daryl say it half a dozen times yesterday. The baby feels only about five pounds heavier than VanDaryl, despite being five months older. Then again, VanDaryl quickly put on a lot of weight after his near-premature birth, and his cheeks have taken on an adorably chubby hue. Carol teases the little girl's lips with the pacifier until she seizes the nipple and settles into a frantic sucking.

"I did a little extra pumping after I fed them in the middle of the night," Shannon says. "The milk's in the cooler if you wouldn't mind giving her a bottle." She strokes VanDaryl's thickening hair as he nurses. "This one's still at it."

Carol holds Sweetheart with one arm as she warms up the bottle, bouncing her lightly to keep her from fussing.

"I feel like such a cow," Shannon mutters. "And _poor_ Garland. At this rate, he's _never_ going to get to play with my tits again."

Carol's too accustomed to the oversharing to laugh. "Well, I'm planning to work three hours for you in the gardens this morning," Carol volunteers. "So you get yourself a nap when they do. I don't have patrol until the evening."

"Thank you."

Once the bottle is warm, Carol settles into the rocking chair with the baby. Looking up at Carol with her soft blue eyes, Sweetheart opens her pale pink lips, latches on fiercely, and sucks hungrily.

Carol's feelings for Henry began with annoyance and intentional distancing but evolved into fondness over time. Eventually they bloomed into a kind of maternal love, but still different from the full attachment she'd once felt toward Sophia. Carol didn't expect the strange and sudden surge of affection that overtook her yesterday when she held this baby. Maybe, after raising Henry for a few years, her heart opened in ways she didn't realize.

Carol never expected to raise another child, not at her age, not after losing Sophia and Mika and Lizzie and saying goodbye to Henry when he decided to become a man too early and leave home for Oceanside. Yet the idea of leaving Sweetheart to an orphanage full of children bothers her, no matter how well the baby may be treated there.

She and Daryl will have a cabin of their own soon, after all. Granted, there won't be much privacy in a one-room cabin if they take in a child, but Carol can make good use of those sturdy drapes they looted from Home Depot. She can string a heavy one all the way across the long side of the cabin, and then divide that drape in two with another to create two separate bedroom areas with just enough room for a bed and a dresser in each. That will make for a tight living room and a smaller kitchen nook, but she can give up on her idea of bookcases and store a few books in the baskets under that couch they took. They might have to be a bit quieter when they make love, especially when Sweetheart is older, with no solid walls between them and such proximity, but they can make do.

Not that Daryl took her hint. Or maybe he _did_ but pretended not to because he doesn't want the responsibility of a child of his own. He did say he preferred playing uncle when she asked him if he regretted that she couldn't get pregnant. She thought then that he was reassuring her, but maybe he really _doesn't_ like the idea of being a father. His own upbringing didn't exactly leave him with much confidence that he'd make a good one, though Carol feels certain he will. If they do adopt Sweetheart, it won't be the fairy tale family she had with Ezekiel and Henry. It will be rawer, but also more real. Daryl won't be giving pretty speeches to his child, but he'll lead by silent example. He won't teach the girl manners, but he'll teach her courage and honesty and loyalty.

Of course, Daryl might find Sweetheart's real parents today, and perhaps that would be the best solution for all involved. Shannon could stop nursing so often, assuming the mother can re-lactate. (Surely her milk has dried up by now.) The parents will be elated to find their baby alive. Sweetheart will have her biological mother and father. And Daryl and Carol will have their privacy. They'll never have to work for Sweetheart rations when she becomes an older child, and they'll be able to be more generous godparents to the Barron children. It would be better for all involved, and yet…

Sweetheart cries and turns her head from the half empty bottle. Carol wedges it by her side in the rocking chair and lifts the baby against her shoulder to rub its back until Sweetheart lets out a mighty burp.

"Daryl would be proud of that belch," Shannon says.

Carol smiles.

[*]

Using the strength of his arms, Daryl hefts himself out of the game pit they've just finished digging and then helps Mitch up. Inola goes down inside to begin lining the sides of the pit with stone. The men hand down several stones to her to start with, and then they clear the dirt piled on two sides of the pit and make sure the earth around the pit is level.

"Why do you want me to give it stone sides, exactly?" Inola asks when they finish clearing the dirt and hand down more stones to her.

"Makes it harder for the animals to get out," Daryl answers. "Gonna keep slippin'. Ain't yer people built pits like this?"

"My _people_?" Inola laughs. "Well, my late husband was a civil engineer. He built bridges in the old world. And I mostly built decorative brick walls and hearths and chimneys. Neither of us hunted. My brother fishes, though. Sometimes he builds stone traps for the fish."

"How ya trap fish with stones?" Daryl asks.

"Not in the river. In a shallow part of the stream, he builds them for the trout. There's one entrance to a stone circle. When they're swimming downstream, he stands in the water and waits. They swim straight in, and he shuts off the entrance with a thick log. A whole bunch are trapped inside."

"Huh."

They work silently for a while, Inola in the pit and the men following her orders above and mixing more mortar and handing things down to her at her request.

"You two aren't very talkative," Inola observes eventually.

"What _should_ we talk about?" Mitch asks her.

"What do you _usually_ talk about when a woman's not around?"

Daryl grunts. "Nothin'."

Mitch, however, makes an attempt at conversation. "How was your second date with Gunther last night?"

Inola pushes a stone into the dirt. "He was a gentleman."

"Think that means he didn't try to fuck 'er," Daryl mutters to Mitch.

Inola overhears. "Oh no, he _tried_ , but subtly, and he took my refusal with grace. Then he asked me out again."

Mitch hands her another stone. "And did you say yes?"

"I figured I might as well. He's a bit old for me, but he's not bad looking. He can carry on a decent conversation. He has a bunch of tobacco and coffee beans he's grown himself, in his private plot, so I guess you might say he's rich. He's probably going to be a Councilman soon, and he's already the assistant farm manager, so you might say he's powerful, too."

Daryl lazily shoots a walker emerging from the woods. He hopes this pit trap catches more animals than walkers over the next few months, and that the walkers don't get to the animals before _they_ do. But given that they only kill one or two walkers a day when they're hunting – and sometimes not even that – he thinks the pit is worth the investment.

"Well that all sounds a bit mercenary," Mitch says.

"Just practical," Inola replies as Daryl recovers his arrow. He returns to the edge of the pit and cleans the tip while Inola continues, "Gunther's a good enough catch. I'm kind of surprised that whore he went to regularly didn't marry him when he asked. I guess she really didn't want that baby. Or to quit drinking."

"You _know_ about all that?" Mitch asks with surprise.

"Gunther told me."

"Why would he _tell_ you that?"

"He didn't want to waste his time if it was a deal breaker for me. But I already knew. It's a small town."

Daryl slathers some mortar across the edge of a stone and hands it down. As usual, he stores all these names and rumors in his brain without comment, as pieces of factual information that may or may not come in handy one day.

"But there's no spark?" Mitch asks. "Between you and Gunther?"

"Not on my end, anyway. Not yet. But I'll give him a chance and see if it develops. I mean… " She shrugs. "If Dante's not going to ask me out."

"I think he _wants_ to," Mitch says sympathetically. "He just…he _can't_. He can't do that to Atohi."

"He wouldn't be doing anything to Atohi. Atohi's dead. You men have a strange sense of honor."

Mitch smiles, and Daryl's surprised to see the introvert talking so freely. Maybe he's more talkative with women than with men. "Not me," Mitch says. "If I were Dante, I'd be all over you like white on rice, even if you'd been married to my _real_ brother."

Inola laughs. "I guess I better be grateful you're not straight."

"If I were, would I be at the bottom of your dating list?"

"Not the _bottom_ ," she insists. "But I hear _your_ love life is taking off."

Mitch's dark skin flushes. "Where'd you hear that?"

"It's just the word around town. That you've found yourself a man. No one knows _who_ , though. You won't give me at least a hint?"

Mitch looks embarrassedly behind himself. "I'm going to get some more sticks to layer over the top of the pit when it's done." Rifle dangling from his shoulder, Mitch disappears between some trees.

"Do you know who he's seeing?" Inola asks Daryl.

"Nah. Ain't none of m'damn business. Ain't none of yers neither."

"Okay, Judgy McJudgerson. Hand me another one of those stones, would you?"

Daryl does.

"I think it's probably some married man, and that's why he's not saying." Inola peers up at Daryl, but he betrays no hint of agreement or disagreement. He doesn't know who Mitch is fucking, and he doesn't care. Carol said she thought it was some young sailor named Harry, but Santiago thinks Captain Cummins is gay, so who knows – maybe it's the captain. If it is the captain, though, Daryl can't help but feel a little offended on Sarah's behalf. She's getting two-timed and wasting her time.

Mitch returns with more sticks. When the pit is complete, he says, "I'll check it tonight and first thing in the morning. You'll check tomorrow afternoon?"

Daryl nods. "Yeah. Assumin' 'm back from trackin' that baby's parents by then."

"I'd help, I would…" Mitch assures him. "But no on-the-clock hours? And we're not likely to scavenge anything."

"'S fine. 'M fine on my own."

Mitch walks with Inola back to the west gate of the Jamestown settlement while Daryl, crossbow in hand and pack on his back, vanishes deeper into the woods and spills out onto the road that leads to the church.

[*]

It's about noon when Daryl reaches the county park located one mile west of the church. This is where Santiago's son Raul told him the cult's hunters used to look for game. They took Raul here twice to hunt, before he tried to leave the group and was disarmed and essentially enslaved.

Raul wasn't with them when they took the baby, but the young man believes this is probably where it happened. According to what they told Raul, they surrounded the couple, snatched the baby, and then robbed and disarmed them. _Mostly_ disarmed them. One still had a pocket knife and managed to cut one of the captors. The couple also managed to escape in the ensuing tumult and bury themselves in the woods. Instead of chasing the parents down, the hunters simply took their things and their baby and left them to die.

Daryl's not optimistic that two people can survive alone in this world with only one pocket knife between them, but he has to at least _try_ to find them, for the sake of that poor baby. Carol's right. Sweetheart deserves parents.

 _Shannon and Garland aren't planning to keep her,_ Carol told him.

Daryl's footsteps still at a camp grill that looks less crusted than the rest. He runs his fingertips over the metal grate and looks down at the charred wood below it. Someone's been cooking on this grill within the last month.

 _She's just a baby._

Carol's words from last night rattle about in his mind.

 _They all deserve a mother and father, don't you think?_

There are some abandoned items beneath the nearby rotting picnic pavilion – things, perhaps, that the cult's hunters didn't bother to take: two sleeping bags, and, between them, a large, padded dog bed the parents may have been using as a makeshift bassinet. They were camped here, at least temporarily, when the cult found them.

 _What if you don't find the parents?_

"Damn," Daryl mutters with sudden realization. Carol _wants_ that baby. She wants them to _adopt_ that baby if he doesn't find the parents.

Does _he_ want to adopt the baby?

He's not at all sure how he feels about that question, so he decides not to think about it. He locks it in some rear compartment of his mind. It won't be relevant if he finds the parents, anyway. So for now, Daryl examines the signs of the scuffle and follows faint hints of the retreating couple.


	83. Chapter 83

A/N: Sorry for the re-uploading mess. I'm trying to fix the order of the chapters since I accidentally skipped uploading one earlier for 82.

[*]

Carol only needs six more signatures on her petition. This morning, she managed to procure another from Dr. Ahmad's wife Tamara, who worked with her in the gardens. The woman is clearly not afraid that Carol is any challenge to her husband's spot on the council, and she wished Carol luck.

After washing up from pulling weeds and planting seeds, Carol ate a late lunch. She has now settled onto the couch in the Barron family cabin with a notebook to compile a list of the candidates for council and what little she knows about them. Meanwhile, Sweetheart is lying on her back on the deer skin rug and playing with a set of plastic keys.

The baby's happy gurgle is music to Carol's ears, a sign that the little girl is regaining health thanks to Shannon's milk. Shannon herself is taking a nap in her bedroom with VanDaryl. Carol puts a pencil to the college-ruled lines of the spiral notebook and begins writing:

Garland Barron – current council chairman & mayor, likely to be re-elected to that position, supportive of a trade route to Oceanside Captain David Cummins – plans to put his name in for mayor (unmarried, dating Sarah), supportive of the trade route Dr. Ahmad – currently on the council, likely to be re-elected, might put his name in for mayor (married, wife: Tamara), supportive of the trade route Carolyn Taylor – currently on council, veterinarian (unmarried, girlfriend: ?), hesitant about the trade route Barry Borowsky –hunter (married, wife: Rebecca, teenage daughter: Rachel, twelve-year-old son: Jake), hesitant about the trade route Lieutenant James Witherspoon – naval officer and fisherman (unmarried, dating: ?), young (25?), position on trade route: unknown Gunther Hamilton – assistant farm manager (unmarried, dating Inola), supportive of the trade route Deputy Andrew – bailiff (unmarried, dating the waitress Trisha), position on trade route: unknown Deputy Thomas – field medic (unmarried, dating ?), thirty-something, supportive of trade route Inola Chotka - mason, wants to represent the workmen (widowed, late husband: Atohi; brother: Adahy, currently dating: Gunther, friend: Dante), position on trade route: unnknown Me

Ana Carter, Marcus Evans, Ernesto Rodriguez, and Shannon Barron are all planning to step down from the council in July. If Carol assumes the current members who are running will be re-elected – and she suspects they will be - that means there are six candidates running for four slots. She'll need to knock two people out of the running to earn a seat on the council.

Two of the men running, Andrew and Thomas, hold the same position as her – deputies. She doesn't think the people are likely to want three lawmen on the council, so those two men will be her most direct competition. She needs to show Jamestown that she has as many skills as they do. Thomas has medical talents; perhaps she should emphasize all she learned from Herschel. Andrew has legal knowledge, having become the court's bailiff when Earl was promoted to sheriff. Perhaps she needs to emphasize how thoroughly she's been studying the charter. Once she shows she has equivalent skills, she needs to differentiate herself, which she thinks she can easily do: she's led troops into war, after all, and governed an entire community.

She doesn't want to pit herself against Inola, because she doesn't like the idea of being the only woman on the council, and Inola is also the only workman running. The builders and carpenters and handymen and engineers will all likely vote for her. She doesn't want to pit herself against Gunther, because he's the only farmer running, and the people will undoubtedly want a representative of their most important industry.

She could pit herself against Lieutenant Witherspoon – there's already another officer and sailor running in the form of Captain Cummins, and James is young and relatively inexperienced. But he's also cute and charming and likely to garner a lot of female votes, although as far as Carol knows he has no girlfriend and isn't dating anyone. The tavern gossips said he'd been to the whorehouse once, before it was shut down, to "pop his cherry" at the old captain's invitation and on his dime, but he never went back. He has skills as a fisherman as well as a sailor, however, and without Marcus running for re-election, the people may want a fisherman on that council – it's Jamestown's second most important industry after farming. Maybe it's _first_ most important, depending on whom you ask.

Carol turns the page of her notebook and considers what ideas and themes she should campaign on. She's about to write something down when Sweetheart rolls over, and then rolls over again, steamrolling toward the fireplace. "

Whoa!" Carol cries. There's no fire lit, but she drops the notebook and hastens from the couch to snatch up the baby before she smacks herself against the iron grate. "Silly girl, you almost banged yourself up," she tells the baby while bouncing her on her hip.

Sweetheart laughs and then squeals happily. It's the first time Carol's heard her laugh since they brought her home to Jamestown, and it sends wing-beats of happiness fluttering through her heart.

[*]

Daryl crouches and again lowers the baby blanket for Dog to sniff. He spent a year teaching the animal to track when they lived alone the woods. It's already paid off in hunting, but maybe now it will pay off in finding these parents. He found the blanket in the dog bed the parents had been using as a bassinet. Surely they cradled the swaddled baby in their arms and their own scent is all over the fuzzy pink material. But he and Dog have hiked for miles in these woods now, and the sign is so obscured by passing time and rains that Daryl's not sure if he's following human tracks or walker tracks. Usually he can tell, but not this time – they aren't fresh enough or obvious enough.

Right now, Dog is his best bet, but for all he knows, Dog is the blind leading the blind. Dog lifts his snout from the blanket and then lowers it to the ground. He sniffs all around, raises his neck, and barks twice before taking off in a steady trot. Daryl, adjusting his backpack on his left shoulder, strides to keep up. While Dog sniffs the ground, Daryl sniffs the air. It smells like rain, maybe even a storm. They'll need to find shelter eventually, but he hopes he finds the parents first, because a strong storm will wash away the last hint of a trail.

[*]

Carol replaces Santiago on patrol at four thirty in the afternoon. She's been patrolling the fort and village for an hour now, while Sarah patrols the dock and museum. Carol gets off work at ten-thirty tonight, when Deputy Andrew will take over her rounds. She prefers the evening shift to the late night one. There's never anything happening after ten-thirty, when the tavern is closed and quiet hours have begun. But this evening, while the sun is still in the sky, the fort and village both are hopping with life.

Carol pauses a moment to listen to the men playing outside of Santiago and Raul's one-room cabin. She takes the opportunity to eat a handful of pecans one by one, as dinner will be on her feet tonight. Raul sits on a wooden deacon's bench before the cabin watching while the men play. One sits in a wicker rocking chair with a guitar, another on a tin bucket with a banjo, and a third stands and fiddles next to Santiago, who chimes in on harmonica.

Carol claps when they end their song. One of the men who had been standing plops down on the deacon's bench next to Raul and lays his fiddle across his lap. "Young man," he says, laying an arm across Raul's back and patting his shoulder, "how would you like to learn the fiddle?"

Raul flinches away from the man's touch, stands, and, eyes darting suspiciously around, takes a step away from him. The man, puzzled, lowers his hand to the deacon's bench. Santiago, leaning a shoulder against the cabin wall near the bench, whispers down, "He doesn't like to be touched by men. He went through some things."

"Oh."

"I'm going for a walk," Raul says, and wanders off alone through the settlement.

"In your rounds," Santiago asks Carol, "Could you maybe keep an eye on him?"

Carol nods and resumes walking in the direction Raul retreated, which is the direction she was head in her patrol anyway. She keeps a safe and unobservable distance. The young man walks with his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his jeans, his eyes darting everywhere. Barry's daughter Rachel, who must be nearly eighteen now, smiles at him and says hello, and he mutters a hello in return and ducks his head before hastening on.

Raul passes the barracks, where several men stand leaning against the stone walls smoking. Gunther Hamilton is with them, but he's not smoking. He's just standing with his thumbs hooked through his belt loops. When he says hello to Raul, the young man veers off without a word.

"Not a very friendly kid," Gunther observes.

Carol slows to a stop. "He's adjusting. He hasn't been in a decent community for two years now. He was with an abusive group recently, and before that he was alone."

"We've had a few refugees who just couldn't acclimate to life in a settled town," Gunther tells her, "but most do in time."

Carol can feel one of the other men's eyes on her, in places she'd rather they not be. She turns to look him pointedly in the eyes, and he smirks, his eyes drooping sleepily. "Evening, deputy," he says. He drops the butt of his hand rolled cigarette, stamps it out beneath his heel, and disappears into the barracks.

"On patrol?" Gunther asks her.

"Until ten-thirty."

"Ah, the drunk hour." Gunther smiles lightly. "Have fun."

"No date with Inola tonight?" Carol asks.

"Have we achieved rumor status already?" Gunther replies. "I must be doing fairly well, then. I suppose I'll enjoy it while it lasts."

"What's that mean?" the smoking man next to him asks.

"It means I suspect Dante will pull his head out of his ass eventually," Gunther answers. He takes off his straw hat and runs a hand through his thick salt-and-pepper hair. "But Inola's getting impatient, so, who knows, she may settle for me." He sets his hat back on his head.

The man next to him scoffs. "I'm not about to be any woman's consolation prize."

"Well, that's because you aren't even in the running," Gunther tells him.

Carol suppresses a smile, nods to the men, and moves on.

Raul has wandered out of the triangular fencing surrounding the fort into the trapezoidal area that houses greenhouses, gardens, pig pens, chicken coops, the brew house, and the warehouse but no cabins. The area is largely empty, as everyone working there has gone home for dinner, except two men Carol can see through the open door of the brew house. She sinks behind a greenhouse tent for a moment and sees that Raul has paused to watch the chickens.

Raul rests one hand on the top of the coop and looks around but finds no one watching him. Quickly, he grabs two eggs and shoves them in the pockets of his pants, looks around, and grabs another two. The chickens begin to cluck wildly, and he hastens away.

 _Shit._ Carol wishes she hadn't seen that. When Santiago asked her to keep an eye on him, it probably wasn't so she could arrest him for petty theft.

[*]

Dog spills out of the woods onto a gravel roadway. Clouds have obscured the sun, leaving the sky a hazy gray. Daryl's glad he brought his pack. He's going to need to stay the night. Even if it doesn't rain, it will be dark before he can hike all the way back to Jamestown, and it will be safer to stay out of the road at night.

Dog trots left a ways, sniffing the ground, and then turns around and trots right. Daryl crouches and tries giving him the scent again, but even after sniffing the blanket, he keeps trotting left and then right, left and then right. "Lost it?" Daryl asks gruffly.

Dog whines.

Daryl sighs. "Yeah. Me, too." He disturbs the gravel on the road with his boot. "Someone's been here, but then the tracks disappear. Can't tell which way they went." He looks at the decaying brown signs with faded yellow letters at the side of the road. One read and points left. "'S go to them cabins." Maybe they went to hole up in one of those, but, even if they didn't, he'll want a roof over his head when these rains roll in.


	84. Chapter 84

A/N: I had to add in a forgotten chapter (82) and am now re-uploading the chapters after it.

[*]

Santiago and his friends are in the a middle of a song when Carol returns Raul to the cabin and says, "May I speak to you privately for a moment?"

Santiago looks at his son warily and then nods toward his open cabin door. Carol follows him inside, while Raul plops himself down on the deacon's bench outside. Carol shuts the door behind them.

The tiny, one-room cabin is dimly lit because clouds have obscured the sun and very little light shines through the open windows. There are no divisions in the cabin. The mattress on the floor in one corner is unmade, with the sheets scattered haphazardly atop it, and there's a cot, recently requisitioned from storage, in the other corner. Two rifles lean haphazardly against the hearth, and a handgun rests on the mantle, beside two boxes of ammunition. Santiago doesn't have a wood stove like the Barrons and must cook over the fire. His pantry is a tall, rustic cabinet standing behind a two-person kitchen table, and there's a single dresser for clothes against the back wall. A worn leather couch, which is slashed and ripped across one arm, rests before a wooden storage-chest that is doubling as a coffee table.

The chest is scattered with old magazines Santiago's apparently collected from houses over the years – _American Riflemen_ , _Asimov's Science Fiction_ magazine, _Horror Fiction Magazine_ , _Maxim_ , and a few _Playboys_. When Santiago sees her looking, he hastens over and slightly straightens the magazines, hiding the _Playboys_ under the _American Riflemen_. "Sorry, I'm never expecting guests. The place is a mess. It's just me here. And, well…" He turns to her, looking embarrassed, "and now my son."

"It's your son I wanted to talk about. I caught Raul stealing eggs from the chicken coop."

A hand on each of his hips, Santiago sighs. "Who knows? Just you?"

"Just me. For now. I made him return the eggs, and I had a talk with him about how seriously Jamestown takes theft." The first conviction results in a fine from rations and/or extra hours worked without pay. The second conviction results in a heftier fine and more labor, as well as a night in a jail cell. And the third conviction…well, the third means banishment. Jamestown operates largely on an honor system that is not taken lightly.

"I work extra hours," Santiago says. "I scavenge, too. I have plenty of food. Raul's been assigned a job, and he got an advance of his rations already. I don't know why he does this."

" _Does_ this?" Carol asks. "It's not his first time?"

"He's been hoarding. I found a bunch of canned soup he took from my pantry in his backpack under the cot."

"He's not used to knowing where his next meal is coming from," Carol reasons. "That and maybe he feels like he always needs to be ready to run. How long has he stayed in any one camp?"

"Williamsburg was the longest. He was there thirteen months. When it was overrun, all he could escape with was a bunch of medicines, because he was working at the apothecary at the time. He didn't have any food on him."

"It's understandable, what he's doing, but it's not acceptable. He can't be stealing from the community."

"I'll talk to him," Santiago assures her.

"I have to make a report to Earl."

"Carol, no you _don't_."

"If it's found out I covered up – "

"- Look," interrupts Santiago, holding up a hand. "We're both deputies here. If anyone's partial in this situation, it's me. So if it ever comes up – it was me who knew, not you. It doesn't have to come back to you. _Please_. If he gets a conviction while on probationary admission, he might not gain citizenship for a year, even if he never steals again."

Carol sighs. She doesn't want this kid to have a black mark on his record two days after arriving, but she doesn't want to shirk her duty either.

"I'll _talk_ to him," Santiago insists. "He returned the eggs, didn't he?"

"Because I _made_ him," Carol replies. "Because I caught him."

"I'll _talk_ to him."

"Then talk to him. But I can't turn a blind eye a second time. You have to know that."

"Understood."

Carol heads toward the door.

"Hey," Santiago says. "If you've got your petition on you, you can give it to me and I'll get the rest of the signatures for you."

She turns back to face him. "That offer sounds an awful lot like a bribe."

"I can't bribe you to do something you've already agreed to do. I meant it as a thank you. Not just for this. You found my son. You're the one who insisted on going back out there. If it weren't for you…I'd never have seen him again. And I respect you, Carol. Your reputation preceded you, but the way you handled yourself out there when we were tracking that baby…the way you've thrown yourself into serving Jamestown…let's just say you've got my vote, and I'd like to see you win a spot on the council."

"I appreciate that, Santiago. I do. But I think it's best if I collect those signatures on my own."

Santiago rubs his dark goatee. "I understand. And I'll talk to Raul, I will. He just…he needs to know things are different here. He needs to get a better sense of how secure this place is, how long it's stood."

"Give him a tour of the museum, if you haven't already."

Santiago nods. "I will."

"There's a psychologist, I'm told. He's counseling Bob and Mary as part of their conviction for assaulting each other. Maybe he could help Raul through some of the trauma he's experienced."

"Yeah, I know who that is. I doubt Raul would be willing to talk to a strange man alone. But…maybe he and I could go together. I suppose I've got my own shit to work through. I suppose we all do. Do you know what he charges?"

"I know he takes ammo. And we did find some on those walkers."

"Yeah. I was hoping to get wasted with that at the tavern. But I suppose I could gamble on a shrink for Raul instead." He walks forward and opens the door for her.

When they exit the cabin, Raul hastens to his feet, tucks his hands in his pockets, and looks bashfully at his boots. "Boys," Santiago tells his friends, "I think that's enough music making for the night. Raul and I are going to head in for a late dinner."

"Looks like rain anyhow," one of the men says, gazing up at the gray sky, and the musicians scatter to their own cabins and huts while Carol stops by the Barron cabin for a raincoat and then continues her rounds.

By the time she's in the Indian village, where she stops to say hello to Inola, the sky has further darkened, and the tiki torches that light the path to tavern are flickering with the increasing breeze. Sarah, who has been patrolling the docks and museum, thunders into the village on horseback to announce that the scout in the first watchtower saw lightening and excessively dark storm clouds on the horizon. Through his telescope, he could see the trees a mile north whipping in the wind. The storm appears to be moving toward Jamestown and will likely hit the town within the next ten minutes. "Batten down the hatches!" she yells, and turns the horse to gallop back to the shelter of the museum.

Word spreads, and there's a flurry of activity in the Indian village. Holes in roofs that are usually left open to vent smoke from fires are closed with swinging, thatch covers. Windows that are typically kept open for air circulation are sealed off with thick paper shades tacked inside the huts to the straw walls, and the beaded entryways are protected with a similar material in a flurry of fluttering paper and pounding hammers. Neighbors hurriedly trade other neighbors for the rare commodity of functioning batteries or for pre-charged solar flashlights, as no fires or oil lamps can be properly vented in the sealed-up huts.

Carol helps Inola to cover one of her windows, and Dante soon materializes to help. "What about your hut?" Inola asks him.

"Adahy and Greg have it under control."

When the last window is done, Dante and Carol exit through the beaded doorway, and Inola follows. "You need to cover the doorway from the inside," Dante tells Inola.

"I know." She puts a hand on his wrist, "But stay with me until the storm passes. I hate being alone in thunderstorms."

Dante laughs. " _You're_ afraid of storms? I didn't think you scared easily."

"When I was a little girl, a tree crushed our trailer during a heavy storm. It nearly killed my mother. I've hated them ever since."

Dante glances back in the direction of his own hut. "The storm may not completely pass until morning. Once we tack that door down - "

"Please?"

Dante chews his bottom lip for a second, but then he disappears inside after Inola. Carol can hear them tacking the protective screen to the doorway. She assists Inola's neighbors to cover their windows and when she exits their cabin, she finds Gunther outside of Inola's hut, looking at the paper-covered doorway. "I came to help," he tells her. "But I guess she's got it covered?"

"Yeah. She's got all covered from the inside."

Gunther's jaw clenches when the sound of Dante's laugh penetrates the paper blinds from within Inola's hut. He tips his farmer's hat down over his forehead and lumbers on in the direction of the tavern, stopping to help an elderly couple struggling to reach and close the thatched cover over the hole in their roof. Meanwhile, Carol moves on through the village, putting out the tiki torches that line the path so they don't blow over in the storm and set fire to huts.

Thunder roars across the blackened sky. The wind picks up, and a torrent of rain suddenly uleashes. Carol raises the hood of her rain jacket. Gunther jogs from out of the hut of the couple, who covers the doorway behind him, and over the howling wind yells to Carol, "Better hole up in the tavern!"

Carol jogs alongside him, and they burst through the swinging wooden saloon doors, soaking wet. Because the taverns have a chimney built for rains, the fireplace is still burning, but the entrance is wet where the rain blows in under the saloon doors. After Gunther and Carol walk in, Candy covers the floor near the entrance with an absorbent mat that will take the brunt of the rain and keep it from trickling across the tavern floors. Gunther helps her to haul the chalkboard sign away from near the entrance and then sheds his coat and drapes it over a chair. He takes off his hat, shakes the rain out of his thick hair, and sets it on a table.

There are no customers. They've all fled home to beat the rain. Carol sheds her wet rain coat and hangs it over a chair. Madam Linda, having just bolted the last shutter, takes a seat by her ledger at one end of the bar.

"Where's Trisha?" Gunther asks.

"She's not working tonight," Candy answers. "She went to the movies with Deputy Andrew. Everyone who did is probably hunkering down in the museum. Did you really come out in this weather for a _drink_?"

"I came to the Village to help Inola batten down, but…" He shrugs. "She already was. And then the storm started and Carol and I came here for shelter. She's on patrol. But she can't patrol in this."

"Well, then you might as well buy me a drink while you're here, Gunther honey," Candy says, and sashays toward the bar, rocking her hips as she walks. She looks back over her shoulder at him.

Gunther appears entirely unaroused. "I don't think so."

"Why?" Candy sits on a stool at the fare end of the bar, opposite where Madam Linda sits, and pats the stool next to her. "Keep me company, handsome. We've all heard you have a green thumb and you've been successful at growing your own private stash of tobacco. _You_ can afford it."

He sighs. "Hell, why not? I was just going to use it to take Inola to dinner tomorrow and to the movies next Saturday, but Dante's riding out the storm in her hut."

"Uh oh," Candy says. "Sorry, honey. You gave it the old college try though, didn't you?"

"How about a round for all _three_ of you ladies, on me, while we wait this out?" Gunther asks.

"That's the spirit!" Candy exclaims.

Outside there's a crack of lightening. Carol can see the flash of light over and beneath the saloon doors, which then swing open at a gust of wind. A patter of rain sprinkles the floor beyond the mat before the doors swing shut again, creaking back and forth until they settle in place.

Gunther doesn't take the stool next to Candy. He takes one closer to Madam Linda, about two stools away from her, and fishes a baggie of tobacco out of his front shirt pocket. "Quality coat. It stayed dry." He lays it on the bar. Carol sits near him, leaving one stool free between them.

"I thank you, Gunther," Madam Linda says, "but I don't drink."

"I'll have yours." Candy slides off her stool and goes behind the bar to start pouring a pint.

"No you won't," Madam Linda insists. "Gunther can buy me a movie ticket with that tobacco instead. And a popcorn."

"A movie ticket?" Gunther asks.

"Well, since you seem to think you won't be taking Inola on Saturday, you might as well take me. I hear they're showing _Roman Holiday_. That's my favorite classic romance. And I could use an escort."

Candy snorts as she sets the pint glass in front of Gunther. "You're fifteen years older _and_ fifteen pounds heavier than him." She winks at him. "You'd rather take a girl my age and shape, wouldn't you?" She straightens her back to show off her chest to full effect.

"I'm sure Linda will make good, _quiet_ company at a movie," he replies.

Candy glowers, pours another pint, and sets it in front of Carol. Then she begins to pour her own. "You've got some nerve looking down your nose at me as often as you used to come by the whorehut to see Megan."

" _Candy_ ," Madam Linda scolds.

"I don't look down my nose at you," Gunther insists before taking a sip from his pint. "But I loved Megan. All y'all think it's a joke, but I did."

"No one doubts _you_ loved _her_ ," Candy assures him. "You've laid enough flowers on her grave. But _you're_ the joke if you think she wanted anything more than your…" She rubs her fingers together. "Filthy lucre."

" _Candy_ ," Madam Linda repeats.

Gunther takes a silent sip of his pint. Candy scoops hers up, throws herself back against the counter behind the bar facing him, and takes a big drink of her own beer.

"Thank you for the drink," Carol tells Gunther, hoping to alter the uncomfortable mood.

"You better hope she doesn't tell Daryl you're buying his wife drinks," Candy says. "He get a little green."

"No he doesn't," Carol insists, even if that's not _entirely_ true. He gets a little insecure is what he gets. Maybe a little insulted. And it suddenly occurs to her that she told him she wouldn't let men buy drinks for her anymore, but she's pretty sure Daryl would see this storm as a special circumstance. She runs one finger up her pint glass worriedly. Daryl is out there in this storm, assuming it's as bad wherever he is. Maybe it's not even raining to the west. Or maybe it's storming worse. And he doesn't have a tavern to run into. He could be in the middle of the woods when lightening strikes.

She _shouldn't_ worry. Daryl's lived through dozens of storms alone in the woods. He knows what to do. But she can't help but worry anyway and wish he was safely beside her to listen to the patter of rain against the tavern walls and share this pint of beer.

[*]

Where Daryl marches along the gravel road, there's only a sprinkle of rain. But the clouds are gray-black as the sun sets and he turns on the solar flashlight he's trying to use sparingly because it doesn't hold a charge for long. Dog trots loyally beside him.

The rain picks up, and Daryl sweeps the beam of his flashlight through it, toward two distant cabins. Is that _smoke_ coming from one of the chimneys? Perhaps the parents camped under the pavilion for one night before finding this more workable shelter. If they'd found the cabins just a day earlier, the cult might not have crossed their paths, and their baby might never have been snatched.

Daryl whistles to Dog. "C'mon boy. 'S see who's lightin' a fire in that place."

Dog yaps, and together they jog toward the cabin, the light of the flashlight bent to the ground. When they get closer, Daryl warns, "Shhhhhh" to Dog and switches off the flashlight. He waves the canine off the beaten path into the overgrown grass and orders, " _Stay_! Less'n I whistle for ya." He wants Dog for surprise backup if needed.

Daryl gives his eyes time to adjust to the darkness and the thickening rain before creeping toward the cabin, trying to stay out of the line of sight from the windows. He crouches as he nears, moves around the side, and then stands up slightly to peer into the window like a Peeping Tom. There's a couple in there all right, their backs to Daryl, roasting some tiny, skinned animal over a spit on the fireplace. They're thin, like they haven't eaten much in weeks, and their hair – one brunette, and the other a dirty blond - is cut very short. From behind like this, he can't see their faces, and he can't even tell if one of them is a woman or not. If it's the parents, they've founded weapons since they were robbed, because there's a knife on the hip of one, a handgun on the hip of the other, and a rifle leaned in the corner of the cabin.

Thunder cracks suddenly, and Daryl ducks beneath the window. Dog, frightened by the sound, barks where Daryl left him in the road. Daryl creeps to the edge of the cabin to silence him, but it's too late. The front door of the cabin flings open. "I think I found us a better supper," the man yells over his shoulder, and raises his rifle and points it in Dog's direction through the falling rain.

Daryl, in one fluid motion, swings his crossbow from his shoulders and springs into sight. "Shoot m'dog 'n I shoot you! Drop the rifle! Now!" Daryl walks close, bow trained forward to show he means business.

The man drops his rifle to the ground and puts up both hands. "I know that voice." He turns and calls over the pouring rain. " _Daryl_? Holy shit! Is that you?"

A strike of lightning flashes in the sky and illuminates the man's face, which is now turned completely toward him, so that Daryl can see both sides of it this time – including the deformed, iron-burned skin on the left side.


	85. Chapter 85

_**A/N:**_ Okay, the missing chapter was added as 82 and it is now all in order. I apologize if you got multiple update notices, but I didn't know how else to fix a missing chapter than to re-upload from that point. .

[*]

Daryl inches his finger toward the trigger of his crossbow. He told Dwight if he ever showed his face again, he would kill him. But Dwight's not showing his face at the Hilltop, or Alexandria, or the Kingdom. It's Daryl who's tracked _him_ down. And the rage Daryl once felt toward the man for killing Denise and torturing him is buried beneath six years of time. Daryl's not the man he was during that war. That war seems like a battle that unfolded in some other world.

"Get inside." Daryl puts a foot down on Dwight's rifle. "Now." Dog, who is at Daryl's heels now, growls fiercely at Dwight.

"Whatever you do to me, man, don't hurt Sherry." Dwight begins to back inside the cabin. Dog follows, growling, as Daryl picks up Dwight's discarded rifle, slings it on his shoulder, and grips his crossbow with two hands again. He inches inside.

Sherry stands before the crackling fire, a knife in her hands, aimed out. The blade doesn't tremble. There's a fierceness in her eyes Daryl's never seen before. Daryl wouldn't have recognized her if Dwight hadn't named her. A belt tightly cinches her gray cargo pants to keep them from slipping off her small waist, and oversized canvass short-sleeve shirt hides her chest so it appears almost as if she has no breasts. Her hair is as short as Carol's was when he first met her in the quarry, but not so nicely styled. It's uneven and sticks up in a hundred places, like it's been brutally hacked short by someone who doesn't know how to cut hair.

Sherry blinks. "Daryl?"

"Put down the knife." Daryl kicks the door shut behind himself and Dog just as thunder rumbles in the sky and the rain falls harder. He wonders if Carol was caught up in this bad weather on patrol tonight, or if it's not storming back at Jamestown. "Heel," he commands the canine. Dog sits on his haunches and licks his nose. Daryl gestures with his bow to the floor. "'N any other weapons ya might have on ya. Both of ya. Now."

After the weapons are stripped off and clunk to the floor, Daryl orders the couple to sit down at the table in the corner. He swings his crossbow onto his back and gathers their discarded weapons while keeping a careful eye on them. The handgun and three knives they threw down, Daryl shovels into his pack for now. The rifle he keeps on his shoulder before standing and examining the couple again.

"If you're going to rob us," Sherry says, "would you please leave us one knife for the dead, and the food on the fire? So we have _some_ chance to survive? Remember I freed you once. _Please_."

"And can you take that off the fire?" Dwight says. "It's about to burn. We haven't had meat in days. You look…" Dwight looks him up and down. "Well fed."

"Pfft." Daryl _has_ put on a few pounds in the past three months. He's in great shape from all the hunting and cabin building, but he's heavier than he used to be, certainly heavier than he was when he last saw Dwight. "Well m'wife's a damn good cook."

"Your _wife_?" asks Dwight, eyes wide.

Daryl walks over to the fire. He holds his bow in one hand, snaps out his bandana from his back pocket with the other, and uses it to pick up the least hot end of the spit. He turns the spit to examine the small hunk of charred, skinned decapitated meat. It's too big to be a mouse, too fat to be a squirrel, and too small to be a rabbit. "Field rat?"

"Yeah. It's the only meat we've caught in six days," Dwight says. "We're down to two bullets in that rifle and three in the handgun. We have to be careful."

Daryl lowers the pointed end of the spit to the wood floor and pushes the meat off with the toe of his boot. "Dog!" he calls. "Dinner!"

"No!" Sherry cries as Dog barks and rushes over to begin gnawing hungrily at the cooked meat.

"Relax," Daryl tells her. "Got deer jerk 'n m pack. Fresh berries, too. Walnuts. Ya ain't got to eat that shit. 'N Dog likes rat."

"Where'd you get all that?" Sherry asks in awe.

"And the wife? Where'd you get the _wife_?" Dwight wants to know.

Daryl doesn't answer. He shoulders his bow and unzips his pack and brings them the food he packed for his own super tonight and lunch tomorrow. He can go without food for one night, and he'll be heading back to Jamestown first thing in the morning anyway, when this storm has passed.

Daryl watches Dwight and Sherry tear gratefully into the food and thinks they must be Sweetheart's parents. Dwight has blue eyes after all, and Sherry has brown hair, and Sweetheart has both. The trail from the picnic pavilion led to the road that eventually lead to these cabins. It doesn't look like they've been living here long, which would make sense, given the bay was snatched about two weeks ago. Since Sherry had the bay six or seven months ago, she's clearly lost any baby weight she may have had, however, and then some. Dwight's thinner than she is; he's probably gone without food a lot so Sherry could have enough to make milk for their baby. They're hungry. They're hungry and desperate, and they'll be desperately happy to hear their child is alive.

And yet some part of Daryl doesn't want to tell them.

[*]

Carol slowly nurses her beer. When the storm passes, and it's light rain again, she'll continue her rounds, if it's not already time for shift change by then.

Candy has pounded her pint and is trying to sweet talk Gunther into buying her another drink. She isn't having much luck, so the waitress changes the subject: "I hear Ernesto's been growing a bit of the wacky weed in his private garden. Any truth to that?"

"He's experimenting for medicinal purposes," Gunther replies.

Candy snorts. "I bet the council will try to outlaw it. The way they shut down the whorehut."

"I doubt the council will attempt to outlaw it, but Jamestown does have to be cautious about how it applies its resources."

"What's that mean?" Madam Linda asks suspiciously.

Gunther turns to her. "Don't worry. I'm not a threat to your livelihood. I won't try to reduce beer and liquor production if I'm on the council. But I think we should stop growing tobacco communally and stop giving out tobacco rations. We should use that field for food. It's very fertile."

"Then you _are_ a threat to my livelihood," Madam Linda returns coolly. "That's what most people use to _buy_ the beer and liquor."

Carol observes the exchange quietly but with interest.

"People will still grow it in their private gardens," Gunther replies. "We just won't be squandering so much fertile community land on its cultivation."

"Easy for you to say Mr. Green Thumb!" Candy exclaims. "You'll grow all the tobacco yourself in your private garden and have all the wealth on the planet!"

"I'm not the _only one_ who can grow tobacco. Plenty of others are growing it in their private gardens."

"So the farmers and gardeners will be rich and everyone else has to be their servants!" Candy cries.

"Nobody has to be anyone's servants," Gunther insists. "Everyone gets the base necessities through twenty hours of work a week, which really isn't much work when you think about it. We all used to work forty or fifty hours in the old world."

"Yeah," Candy says, "and we used to have air conditioning and central heat and color television and shopping malls and pizza delivered to our door. And _liquor stores_." 

"Tobacco may not be the healthiest or most productive thing in the world," Carol muses out loud, "but I've come to understand it functions well as money here. It's value is clearly defined. It's easy to carry around. It facilitates trade amazingly well, and the ease of internal trade this community it's amazing. It's not like anywhere I've ever lived."

Candy points to Carol. "What she said. If it ain't broke, don't fix it! You got my vote, sister."

"I'm just thinking it through," Carol says. "I'm willing to hear Gunther's perspective out."

"We trade with bullets, too," Gunther reasons. "With coffee beans, canned soup, and jarred preserves, all of which are more important to produce."

"Why is coffee more important than tobacco?" Madam Linda asks. "Because _you_ like your morning cup of Joe?"

"Well, let's say it's less harmful, then, if not more important," Gunther replies. "We stop growing tobacco communally, people might increase the use of other bartering tools that have more value in and of themselves, and that will increase their supply. And, like I said, some people will still grow tobacco."

" _Some people_ ," Candy scoffs. "Sounds like you want on the council to make yourself rich."

"I'm _already_ rich."

"Then prove it and buy me another drink," Candy replies.

"Fine," Gunther agrees. "Have yourself one more on me. I've got no family to support. And probably no woman to romance after tonight." Gunther fishes out some more tobacco, rolled in paper this time and tosses it on the bar.

Candy weighs it on the little scale. "That's enough for two drinks."

"Then give the second to Carol."

"No, thank you," Carol says. "I'm on duty. I probably shouldn't be drinking even the one." And maybe she says no, also, out of respect for Daryl's discomfort with men buying her drinks.

"Then give it to me," Gunther says. "Later. When I finish this one." He raises his pint slightly.

Candy grins and gets herself a shot of moonshine. "You really think Inola and Dante are fucking right now?"

"I don't think he invited himself in to play cards," Gunther answers.

"He didn't invite himself in," Carol clarifies. "She invited him."

"Ah, well, then there's still hope," Gunther says. "I thought he'd finally given up fighting his conscience."

"Well if he hasn't, he will tonight," Candy insists. "In such close quarters? With almost no light? And a thunderstorm to throw Inola into Dante's big, strong arms? Yeah _right_. You're too old to compete for Inola anyway, honey. Aren't you fifty now? I'm surprised she gave you a second date in the first place. She was probably just trying to make Dante jealous."

"Perhaps." He sips from his pint and sets it down. "But I think she enjoyed herself with me."

"She enjoyed the dinners and beer you bought her."

"You're too cynical," Madam Linda tells Candy. "I'm sure Gunther's charming company."

[*]

"What are you doing this far south?" Dwight asks. It's the second time he's asked it, because Daryl's mind has been elsewhere. "So far from the Hilltop and Alexandria?"

Carol's already fallen in love with that baby. Daryl can't stand to see her heart break when Sweetheart's taken from her. And if the baby is taken from her, they won't even be godparents to it. If Jamestown takes Sherry and Dwight in, it's not as if they'll ever be friends with the Dixons. There's too much painful history there for Daryl to do anything but tolerate Dwight's presence. They won't be any part of that baby's life, not really.

At first, Daryl imagines his concern is entirely for Carol's feelings. But he can picture that baby now, looking up at him with her big blue eyes and sucking on his fingertip for comfort. Even though he didn't let his _mind_ think about the question, maybe his _gut_ already said yes without him knowing it. _Yes._ _We'll raise the baby. We'll make her ours._

"Daryl?" Sherry asks. "How are you here?"

Daryl swallows. He doesn't tell him how he's here, or that there's a thriving town just a few miles away. He doesn't tell them about their baby, not yet. He says, "Could ask the same of y'all."

[*]

"What did you do in the old world, before the Great Sickness?" Carol asks Candy, using the Jamestown term for the outbreak. She'll never say _cannibals_ , she doesn't think, but some of the vocabulary has already worked its way into her speech.

"I was a college student."

"Yeah?" Gunther asks. "Going for your Mrs. degree?"

Candy glares at him, but Madam Linda says, "Turnabout is fair play. You've been giving him a hard time all night."

"You're not that young are you?" Gunther says. "No offense, but I thought you were at least thirty-five."

"I'm thirty- _three_ , thank you very much."

"Still too old to have been a college student when – "

"- We don't _all_ have parents who put us through college right out of high school," Candy interrupts him. "Some of us had to _work_ our way through. I went part-time and waitressed. It took me _years_. I was six credits shy of graduating when the shit hit the fan."

"You think _I_ got put through college?" Gunther asks. "I grew up on a family farm. I dropped out of high school at sixteen and helped my parents until they died. Then I inherited the farm and spent the next ten years working to pull it out of debt."

"But you talk like you're educated," Candy says.

"I _am_ educated. Self-educated."

"I never went to college either," Carol says. "But I don't suppose I talk like I'm educated."

"You're clearly educated in the school of hard knocks," Gunther replies. "How about you, ma'am?" he asks Linda. "Did you go to college?"

"And grad school. I have an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School."

Gunther blinks in surprise.

"And please don't call me _ma'am_. It makes me feel old."

"You _are_ old," Candy tells her.

"I'm only fifteen years older than Gunther, and as you pointed out, he's fifteen years older than Inola, and she didn't think of _him_ as old. Neither did Megan, and she was ten years younger."

Candy rolls her eyes. "Well, Megan was paid to think of him whatever he _wanted_ her to think of him."

Gunther's grip tightens on the stem of his pint glass.

"Stop, Candy. Enough," Madam Linda scolds. "The woman's dead."

Gunther's grip slackens and he turns from Candy to Madam Linda. "I didn't call you ma'am because I think of you as old. It's just how I was raised to address women. It's a sign of respect."

"Then how come you never call _me_ ma'am?" Candy asks indignantly.

Gunther and Madam Linda chuckle, and Carol hides her snort in her pint glass.

[*]

After Sherry ran from the Saviors, Daryl learns, she survived by scavenging. She went from house to house, spending a night here, a night there, settling nowhere. She collected some ammunition, a rifle, and two handguns on the way. Most houses had been looted by then, of course, but there was a rare find here or there – buried under a pile of underwear in a dresser drawer, behind a false wall, in an attic.

Dwight searched for her, going from house to house in the northern Virginia suburbs and hoping to find more notes, hoping she'd changed her mind about not wanting to be found. In the end, he decided to go back to the small Virginia town where they'd grown up and they were married. Maybe she'd made her way home, and, in fact, she had. He found her living in the town's Dollar General Store, off of the only remaining food she could find – the pet food.

Dwight slumps in the wooden chair and looks at the crumbs of the meal Daryl gave him lying on the table. "All I could think of when she told me that was all those dog food sandwiches I served you."

It would serve _him_ right, Daryl thinks, but Sherry was the one eating them. He has nothing against Sherry, except that time she held a gun on him in the woods and helped to steal his bike. But she _did_ free him from Negan, and at risk to herself. Maybe if she hadn't, he would have broken eventually. Maybe he'd have become Negan's righthand man, and proven to be even more brutal than Dwight. He likes to think he never would have, that nothing could ever cause him to serve the man who murdered Glen and Abraham, but the truth is that he doesn't actually know what his limits are. "Dog food ain't that bad when yer hungry," Daryl mutters.

Negan thought the dog food would humiliate him, but the truth was, he'd willingly eaten dog food once when he was growing up, when his mother had forgotten to shop for too long and there was no other food in the house. He got free school lunch during the school year, but summers could be rough. He didn't take the food out of the dog's mouth, though. The dog was already dead and the food was leftover.

Daryl named the stray dog Clifford and begged his parents to let him keep it. They grudgingly allowed it, provided he bought the dog's food with the money he made collecting and recycling cans and bottles. Daryl loved Clifford and felt like he had a real friend for the first time in his life. But within a year, his father shot the dog for being a "goddamn biter," which is to say the dog got in between the man's fists and Daryl one day. Clifford ripped into Will Dixon's arm, leaving a permanent scar.

After that, Daryl learned not to name any of the pets he adopted. The stray cat he fed out back was just Cat. The turtle he kept in a shoe box was just Turtle.

Sherry's voice interrupts his thoughts: "It does have nutrients. And you get used to the taste."

Dwight and Sherry moved on together from the Dollar General. They hunted and scavenged where they could, until one day, finally, they found a growing community in historic Williamsburg and joined it. "We lived there twelve months before it was completely overrun by a herd of walkers and we had to flee," Sherry explains. "We escaped with another couple, and we searched for survivors for a few weeks, but we never found anyone. So we just went back to hunting and scavenging and wandering and… _surviving_. For almost two years."

Daryl doesn't ask what happened to the other couple, because what he hears is _Williamsburg_. "Yer from _that_ camp?" Daryl asks. "Did ya know a kid named Raul?"

Dwight looks up as if trying to recall information and shakes his head slightly.

"You're memory has always been shit, honey," Shelley tells him. "I remember Raul. He wasn't a _kid_ , really. He must have been nineteen. He was apprenticed to that former pharmacist in the old apothecary shop."

"Don't remember him."

"He had the girlfriend, the pretty redhead?" Sherry shakes her head. "She got torn apart."

"Oh. Yeah," Dwight says.

Sherry turns to Daryl. "How do _you_ know him? Did he _survive_? Did you _find_ him? Did he find you? Do you have a _real_ camp somewhere?"

Daryl bites down on his back teeth and breathes through his nose. Now it's time to tell them what he knows, what they found – time to tell them he's found their baby.

It's time…and yet he doesn't _want_ to.


	86. Chapter 86

_**A/N:** _If you feel like you missed a chapter at some point, it was because I forgot to upload one. Ooops. Go back to chapter 82 for the missing chapter, and everything is now in order from that point forward. _This is the latest new chapter_ , not a re-upload. Sorry for the mess, and I'll try not to do that again.

[*]

Candy's sitting on the counter behind the bar, facing Gunther, Carol, and Madam Linda. "Come on. Just one more, handsome? I know those pockets aren't empty."

"Last one," Gunther insists.

Candy slides down, steadies herself on her feet, and giggles. "I should have eaten dinner."

"If you're buying her another drink," Madam Linda warns Gunther, "You're carrying her to bed when she's done."

"I thought you said never to turn tricks in your tavern," Candy replies as she pours herself another pint.

"I just mean you won't make it up the ladder to the loft on your own. I don't think Gunther's trying to buy your services. He never wanted to when you were selling them more openly and for less."

"Ouch." Candy slaps her full pint on the bar and stumbles around from the inside to sit on the stool next to Gunther, on the other side of him from Carol. "So who are you going to chase now that Inola's probably done with you?" Candy asks. "One of the Kingdom women?" She looks over him and down the bar at Carol. "That widow woman is still single, isn't she? Amy? The one with the teenage girl?"

Daryl found Amy's husband, leg snapped and body chewed over by walkers, down the ravine. It was the only real tragedy they experienced those ten months together in the Kingdom, before it fell entirely. "I don't know," Carol replies. "I don't keep track of everyone's love life."

"I heard Santiago asked Amy out and she shot him down after one date," Candy says.

"That was Sarah," Gunther tells her. "The one who patrols the docks. She settled on the captain."

"Well, when she figures out the captain's gay, maybe Santiago will have another shot at her," Candy suggests.

"What makes you think he's gay?" Gunther asks.

"He never went to the whorehut when he was single," she reasons.

"Neither did Garland," Gunther says. "Or Dante. Or Santiago. Or Earl. Or a lot of men."

"Not a _lot_ ," Candy assures him. "I can count on the fingers of two hands the number of single men who never set foot in there. Speaking of which…when you're on the council, are you going to introduce a motion to legalize prostitution again?"

"That's not high on my list of priorities," Gunther tells her.

"It's safer when it's legal."

"It's safer when you don't do it at all," he replies.

"You're one to talk, _John_."

"I would have married her. I would have raised that baby, whether it was mine or not. If she'd just… _let_ me." He takes a long draught of his pint. "There'd be no point in re-opening the whorehut, Candy. Who's left to work there? The prostitutes are all dead or married except you."

"And Trisha."

"She's not interested in that line of work anymore," Madam Linda says. "And she'll probably marry Deputy Andrew before long."

"Well, maybe one of the Kingdom women will want to work there," Candy suggests.

"I assure you none will," Carol says coolly.

"It's easier than cleaning fish or tilling fields or even patrolling docks," Candy insists.

Gunther turns to Carol. "I'm surprised Daryl hasn't come to check on you. I'd be worried if I were him."

"Worried you'd be coming onto your woman?" Candy asks.

"No," Gunther replies thinly. "Worried that she's safe in this storm."

"He left this afternoon to look for the parents of that baby we found," Carol tells them. "He's probably sought shelter for the night somewhere." She hopes he has, anyway. And some guilty part of her hopes he hasn't found Sweetheart's parents.

 _I have children_ , she reassures herself. Henry calls her mother. VanDaryl will call her godmother. Gary calls her aunt.

But none of those children are really hers, not even Henry – he's become his own man now, far too soon, and if she's lucky, and they establish that trade route, she'll see him at most three times a year.

[*]

 _Found yer baby. Fed 'er, 'n she's alive 'n well._

Those are the words Daryl _means_ to say.

But the words he actually says, as he leans back against the cabin wall facing the table, are "Found Raul, yeah, when we was out tryin' to see where a fresh walker come from."

"Out from your camp?" Sherry asks.

"Out from m' camp," Daryl echoes. "Raul's back there. 'S fine."

"Can we…can we go to your camp?" Sherry asks hopefully.

Dwight shakes his head slightly. "Daryl's not going to let me into any camp of his."

"Ain't _mine_ ," Daryl says. "Just live there. I ain't even on the council."

"It's big enough to have a council?" Sherry asks. "And it's not ruled by a single man? No dictator?"

"Did ya have a dictator in Williamsburg?" Daryl asks.

"Yeah," Dwight answers, "but he wasn't as cruel as Negan. He was more of an ass like Gregory, only he wasn't a physical coward. Or I'd have toppled him."

"No you wouldn't have," Sherry insists. "You didn't want that responsibility. He was the leader we needed."

"Yeah, well, I used to say that about Negan, too, and I was wrong."

"At least he didn't try to take anyone's wife," Sherry says bitterly, and Dwight looks down guilty at the table. "But none of that matters now," she continues. "The Williamsburg Colony is gone."

Dwight looks up at Daryl, who still stands leaned against the wall. "You have a camp near _here_? What happened to the Hilltop? To Alexandria? To the Kingdom? To Oceanside?"

"Kingdom fell. Pipes burst. Place rotted. Had to pack everyone up. Moved 'em to Hilltop. Alexandria. Oceanside. 'N…'n to the place where I am now."

"Which is where?" Sherry asks.

"Ain't gonna tell ya that. But I'll take ya there. Ya go in unarmed, 'n ya get interviewed by the sherrif 'n the mayor – "

" _Mayor_?" Dwight asks. " _Sheriff_? How _big_ is this place?"

"Biggest damn place you ever seen since this shit started. Bigger 'n the Sanctuary 'n all its satellites combined."

"Holy shit," Dwight mutters.

Sherry looks Daryl straight in the eye. "So they interview us and then – "

"- Then they decide if ya get probationary admission. 'N if they do, give ya a job in exchange for rations. Do yer job, keep yer nose clean for three months, ya become a citizen. Can vote and run for council and shit. Carol's runnin' for Council."

"Carol?" Sherry asks.

"She fought for the Kingdom in the war," Dwight tells her, but then pauses to look at Daryl, " _That_ Carol?" Daryl nods and Dwight continues, "She was like a general for the Kingdom."

"She was their queen," Daryl says, "for a few years. 'Fore it fell, 'n she led some of our people to – to where 'm takin' ya."

"Your people?" Dwight asks.

"Carol's 'm wife."

"Oh," Dwight replies, and he doesn't sound as surprised as he did the first time Daryl mentioned a wife. Maybe he's had time to think about the fact that, despite an iron-burned face, and despite letting Sherry hand herself over to Negan, even _he_ has a wife.

Daryl will never understand that – how Dwight could stand by knowing Negan was fucking his wife. They could have run away together again. Maybe they'd have been caught, as they feared, but they could have _fought_. Daryl would rather die fighting than let some other man claim Carol. And Carol would never give herself up that way to save him. Oh, she might _die_ fighting to save him, but she'd never become a slave to save him. She has too much spirit for that.

He can't wrap his mind around what Dwight and Sherry did to survive. And what makes it especially hard to understand is that he knows they love each other. He wonders, suddenly, if Dwight would let his own daughter sell herself to a lecherous man, if it would mean saving his own ass. The thought sends anger flickering up his spine. "How is it ya lost yer baby two weeks ago," hespits, "'n ya haven't even fuckin' mentioned 'er? All ya care 'bout is if ya can feed yer damn face."

Sherry and Dwight exchange a glance. Sherry turns to Daryl. "You found the baby?"

[*]

Candy flings an arm around Gunther's shoulders. "You're pretty good looking when I'm drunk." She runs her fingertips over the thick, black-and-gray stubble on his cheeks. "Five o'clock shadows are so damn sexy. Even if you are old enough to be my daddy."

"Maybe if he'd had you when he was seventeen," Madam Linda says.

"My daddy had _me_ when he was seventeen," Candy says. "And then he took off."

Gunther takes her arm and removes it from his shoulder, and Candy slides right off the stool and lands on the floor with a laugh.

Gunther steps down from the stool. "Time to get you to bed." He picks Candy up, flings her over his shoulder, and walks toward the ladder that leads up to the loft.

Candy, hanging halfway down his back, lifts her head to look at Carol. "Wow!" she tells Carol, pointing at Gunther with one finger, "He's strong!" Then she flops her head back down.

Gunther contemplates the ladder.

"Think he can get her up there one handed?" Carol asks.

"Gunther's a problem solver," Madam Linda assures her.

Carol watches the live comedy as she sips her pint of her beer – her second. She decided to buy herself one with three bullets from her handgun. This storm doesn't seem like it's going to pass anytime soon. The rain still batters the rooftop, and the wind whips against the bolted shutters until they shudder.

Gunther does figure it out, though it's touch and go for a while. Once he gets up into the loft, he yanks open the curtain that closes off Candy's bedroom and throws her down on her bed. Carol looks away when Candy seizes Gunther by the shirt collar and yanks him down to kiss him, but he must pull away, because Carol can hear Candy's loud whining, "Oh come on! You deserve it after all the drinks you bought me. Come on and fuck me, Gunther. I mean, I might pass out during, but you can keep going until you're finished."

Gunther mutters something unintelligible. There's the swish of the curtain closing on Candy's room, and the next thing Carol hears is the clatter of work boots on the ladder and then the hard thud of them against the tavern's wood floor. Gunther resumes his seat at the bar.

"What do you think she was majoring in at college?" Gunther asks.

"Nuclear physics," Carol replies.

Madam Linda laughs and so does Gunther at first, but then he winces. "Hell, maybe she was. We all had hopes and dreams once, didn't we? Before this world crushed them. We were all someone else, until this world made us what we are."

"Some of us still _do_ have hopes and dreams," Madam Linda says.

"And some of us are living ours," Carols adds.

" _This_ is what you dreamed of doing?" Gunther asks. "Being a deputy in a town of people reeling from PTSD, in a world where the dead feast on the living?"

"For a long time, I didn't dream of being anything at all," Carol says quietly. "And now I have a husband who loves me in a way I never thought I could be loved. A man I love in a way I never even knew I was _capable_ of loving. I'm a mother to a young man who successfully struck out on his own at sixteen, a godmother to a beautiful baby boy, and an aunt to a clever little preschooler." And maybe she's something to Sweetheart, too, though she doesn't know how long she will be. "I'm a deputy and, who knows, I may be a council woman come July. This world changed me, too. It changed me, and it changed me again. But not always for the worse." She looks into her almost empty pint and is surprised by her honest sharing with these near strangers. "Wow, this is strong brew, isn't it?"

Gunther smiles.

[*]

"N yer _sure_ they're dead?" Daryl asks again. He's reeling from the information Dwight and Sherry have just given him.

The baby isn't Sherry's. It belongs to the couple with whom they escaped Williamsburg. The four of them wandered together for a little over a year before the baby was born. They stayed put for a while when they found a farm, long enough for the baby to be born and raised to five months, but the farm was overrun, not enough food was growing, and they had to move on. They kept moving in search of food. Dwight and the other man, Dennis, went without food as much as they could manage to so their wives could have more. Sweetheart's father denied himself even more Dwight, because his wife needed enough nutrition to make milk. He was near starving when they all happened upon the park.

"He just couldn't move on," Dwight said. "And his wife wouldn't go on without him. So we set up camp under the picnic pavilion for a couple of nights. We managed to catch something to eat on the second day."

"Yeah. Saw that grill was used," Daryl mutters.

"Sherry and I wanted to check out the park cabins we saw on a map, clear them and see if they'd make good shelter for a while. So we hiked out here to check. We were only gone four hours. We thought they'd be fine. They were armed. He was weak, but she had her strength. We thought they'd be safer waiting there for us than hiking and clearing cabins. But when we headed back…" Dwight sighs and shakes his head. "There was nothing there but the sleeping bags. We went looking for them. There were fresh prints. Even I could track them."

"Them prints are gone now," Daryl says. "Lost 'em on the road."

"They had tried to come find us for help after they were robbed," Dwight continues.

"But a dead one came out of the woods after them," Sherry explains, "and they ended up having to run in the opposite direction of the cabins. Dennis had eaten too little. He was too weak, and he collapsed in the road. Alexandra tried to fight the dead one off him, but she had no weapons. Only a stick. She got bit in the process."

Dwight winces. "We had to put them both down. We burned their bodies up the road from the pavilion. We didn't have the energy to dig graves."

Maybe Daryl should have looked down that direction, but he was intent on following the sign to the cabins. He would have seen the scorched earth, perhaps, but then he would have been distracted in that direction.

"Before we put Alexandra down," Sherry says, "she told us what happened, that five men had surrounded them by surprise, disarmed them, stolen their things and taken their baby. Why would they take the baby?"

"Ya don't wanna know why," Daryl mutters.

"And how did you find her?" Dwight asks.

"'S 'n even longer story. But she's safe. She's a'ight. Got a wet nurse feedin' 'er."

Sherry lets out a shaky, relieved laugh. "We thought she was dead for sure. She's really _alive_?"

Lightening cracks outside, and the wind howls through the trees. Dog whimpers, lies down in front of the fireplace, and rests his head on his paws. Daryl wonders if Dwight and Sherry will want to raise the baby now that they know it's alive. They were with the parents since Sweetheart's birth. They must have been close to Sweetheart's mother and father. Best friends. Maybe even godparents to the baby. But he doesn't ask, because he doesn't want to know the answer, not now.

"Gonna stay here tonight," Daryl says. "Take ya to m'camp in the mornin'. See 'er for yerselves."


	87. Chapter 87

Carol pushes open the swinging saloon doors and peers out. A light drizzle of rain mists the air, and the stars are barely visible, but they shine down enough light to reveal the muddied path, which is littered by fallen tiki torches, one of which still rolls gently in the breeze. The saloon shutters creak shut, and Carol walks to the chair where she left her raincoat.

Gunther turns on his stool. "Are you fixin' to leave?"

"I'm off to finish my rounds and re-set the fallen torches," she says as she puts on her coat.

Gunther pulls from his pants a chain that ends in a silver pocket watch that makes Carol think of Hershel. "It's lights out in twenty minutes. I wouldn't bother to re-light them." He slides off the stool. "I'll walk with you and help you stand them up." He pats the bar with the palm of one hand. "Thank you for the complimentary coffee, ma' – _Linda_."

Madam Linda smiles. "Well, we had to do something to pass the time. I'll see you Saturday night, for the movie?"

"If I don't see you before then." Gunther plucks up his straw hat from the table where he left it and puts it on his head. "You know I'm a regular around here." He shrugs into his coat and follows Carol out.

Carol lights her oil lamp to guide the way. "I think Candy's right," she says after the saloon doors creak shut. "I think Madam Linda _is_ sweet on you."

Gunther chuckles. "Bit of an age difference there. She's 65."

"Ah, but it'll be fine for you to be interested in a 50-year-old woman when _you're_ 65, right?" Carol asks as she pauses by a fallen torch. She holds up the lamp so Gunther can see to drive it back into its spot along the path.

He pushes in the muddy earth around the bottom with his boot, and the torch holds when he lets go of it. "I never said it _wasn't_ fine for her to be interested in me, did I? I pass no judgment on her good taste."

Carol chuckles.

"You imagine I have a particular preference for much younger women. I don't. It's just that all of the women near my age – give or take five years in either direction - are thoroughly snatched up. You, for example. So I settled on the half my age plus seven rule."

Carol does the math as they walk. "So thirty-two and up?"

He nods. "And Inola's thirty-five. Although she doesn't get half my music and movie references."

Carol, smiling, illuminates another torch for him to reset. "Well, half of 65 plus 7 puts you well within Madam Linda's range."

One side of Gunther's mouth ticks up. "I'm sure she and I will be great friends." He steadies the fallen torch in place and walks on.

"I'm a few years older than Daryl," Carol muses.

"Not _fifteen_ years older."

"No." But she is _aware_ she's slightly Daryl's senior sometimes, mostly when she sees younger women admiring her husband's arms.

Nate, the Kingdom's former carpenter, who now lives in the old whorehut with six other Kingdom people, is outside one of the nearby huts, on a ladder, patching a hole in the roof. A large tree branch lies on the path before the hut.

"Is it bad?" Carol asks.

"No, I'll have it fixed up shortly. Their floor got muddy, though, right under where the hole got ripped. Fortunately there aren't many trees close to the huts."

Carol and Gunther walk on, righting torches and blown over rocking chairs and lawn chairs that weren't brought inside, and inspecting the huts for damage, but there isn't much. From Inola's hut, smoke trickles from the now re-opened hole in the roof, though the paper shutters remain in place. _Other_ sounds drift from the opening too. Dante, it appears, has given up repressing his feelings for his late best friend's wife.

Gunther flushes a beet red and walks quickly on. Several yards away, in the dim glow of the mist-filtered starlight, he struggles to reset another torch. Carol hastens to catch up, and when she raises the oil lamp to better light the scene, he slides it into the hole in the ground with ease.

"Well I guess that settles that," he says as they walk on. The man sounds more pride-wounded than heartbroken, and more embarrassed than angry. Carol's not sure what consolation to offer, so she says nothing, but she walks with him as far as the barracks, where he lives.

"I still have thirty minutes on my rounds," she tells him. "Thanks for the pint of beer, and for the discussion." While waiting out the last of the storm, they ended up talking trade routes, crop rotation, patrols, defense, distribution of scavenged goods, maternity and paternity leave, whether the Council should get 15 hours credit for its work, and whether the mayor's position should get a full 20, and how people would react if the Council "voted itself a raise" in that sense.

"Well," Gunther says, "you have my support on three-times a year trade trips if I have yours on using at least half that south east field for non-tobacco production."

"You sound sure we'll both be on the council."

"It doesn't hurt to get a head start on the wheeling and dealing. Goodnight, Carol." He tips his straw hat to her and disappears into the barracks, while she patrols on.

She lowers her hood as the mist has stopped. In the trapezoidal section of the settlement, two men are bringing the goats out of the barn. They were crowded inside for protection during the storm. Two other men are removing the tarps that were used to cover the pig pen for temporary shelter, and another is uncovering the chicken coop. The chickens cluck loudly. "Evening Deputy Dixon," the man by the chicken coop says as she nears.

Carol smiles to hear Daryl's name attached to her. "Any damage?" she asks as she comes to a stop.

"There's a small leak in the barn, but it just muddied the earth a bit. We'll get a carpentered to fix it tomorrow. The animals are all frightened, but they're fine. I hear you're planning to run for Council?"

"Word gets around, huh?" Carol doesn't even know who this man is, but he seems to know her.

"Gunther says you seem sensible and you know a bit about everything, including gardening. There aren't enough agricultural people running for that council. Shannon at least knows gardening, but she's not running again." Carol didn't expect to have an in with the farmers. She's going to have to play up the gardening skills she learned from Nabila and her managerial experience in seeing that the Kingdom's gardens were tended. "I'll sign your petition if it isn't full yet," he offers.

"Thank you." Carol pulls it out of her front shirt pocket, along with the pencil she keeps there. She's not sure she should be doing this while on patrol, but Andrew did the other day. She observes the man has a wedding ring when he signs, and sees that his name is _Eric Andrews_ and makes a note to remember the face.

Five signatures to go.

[*]

Daryl settles on the dusty throw rug near the fireplace with Dog while Dwight and Shery spoon together in the double-sized bed that was in the sparsely furnished cabin when they found it. He rolls on his back and looks up at the cabin ceiling, which is spread with water stains. The roof survived the torrent, but he doubts it will survive a second one. Not that it matters. The rain has quieted and will likely taper off still more over the next hour before stilling entirely. And then he's taking Dwight and Sherry to Jamestown in the morning.

"'S 'er name?" he asks. "The baby?"

"Alexandra," Sherry answers. "After her mother."

"Ain't bad," Daryl mutters. He could make a lot of nicknames with that name. Alex. Alexa. 'Zandra. Lex. Lexie….but he'll probably mostly call her Sweetheart, that is, if he stays a part of her life.

A knot twists his heart, and he's surprised to find he wants what Carol wants – to raise that baby. He's not sure _why_ he wants it, when he had such a shit father himself. And he's not sure he wouldn't fuck it up, either. Maybe it's best if Dwight and Sherry are the ones to raise it up. Maybe they want her, and maybe they'll lay claim to her when they see her again.

[*]

When her rounds are over and Carol returns to the Barron family cabin, the shutters are closed tightly and it's dark inside. Shannon is asleep on the couch with Sweetheart at her breast. The baby has unlatched, and is breathing softly as her little back rises and falls beneath her soft pink onesie. Carol turns down the oil lamp so as not to wake Shannon with the light and sets it on the end table. She carefully picks up the baby and lays her in her crib next to Van Daryl's. The baby boy is on his back, his arms raised above his shoulders and his head turned to the side.

After she lays Sweetheart down, Carol strokes her light brown hair softly, plants a little kiss on her forehead, and wonders if Daryl will return tomorrow alone or with the parents. As she stands straight, Sweetheart squirms, rolls onto her stomach, and settles. Carol remembers the instruction about making babies sleep on their backs, but every time she tried to force Sophia on hers, the girl just rolled over again. Eventually she decided that if Sophia could roll over, she could also roll back if needed, so she leaves Sweetheart to her preferred position, but she removes the blanket from the crib. Then Carol pulls the afghan up around Shannon and tucks her in before heading to bed herself. She passes the open door of Garland and Shannon's bedroom on the way and finds Gary – likely frightened by the storm – in bed with his father instead of on the trundle. The boy sleeps soundly, with one leg slung over his father's abdomen, as Garland slumbers on his back.

Carol stays awake for the next two hours, lying in a bed that feels strangely empty without Daryl, wondering what – or who – the morning will bring.

[*]

After two hours hiking, they're within two miles of Jamestown. Daryl's stomach rumbles with hunger because he gave the last of his packed food to Dwight and Sherry. They look so emaciated. He's fasted for much longer, of course, but not recently. "Gonna like Jamestown," he says. "Lots of food. 'Nuff rations for three squares a day."

"Jamestown?" Dwight asks.

He hadn't meant to say the name of the place, but he suppose it doesn't matter. He's taking them there, after all. But for some reason he wanted to hold that back.

"Who assigns the rations? The mayor?" Sherry asks.

"The Council. Just gotta work twenty hours a week for the basics. More if yer raisin' a kid, though." He peers at her to see if she'll mention Sweetheart, but she doesn't. "Gotta work ten hours for little kids, twenty hours for bigger ones. So ya gotta work double if ya want a kid."

"She can't have kids," Dwight says.

"I have POI," Sherry adds.

Daryl has no idea what POI is, and he doesn't want to know. "Meant, if ya wanted to raise Sweetheart."

"Oh," Dwight says. "I thought she'd been adopted by that woman you said was feeding her?"

"We'll take care of her, of course," Sherry tells him, "if no one else wants to."

Relief eases through Daryl's nerves. "She'll be a'ight," Daryl assures her. He doesn't say any more than that, doesn't think he should without first discussing the matter with Carol.

As they walk, Dwight and Sherry ask a lot of questions about the community – does it have entire families, does it have animals, does it have walls. "We should have had walls at Williamsburg," Dwight mutters. "Or at least more fencing than we did."

"We were building," Sherry says. "It was just too hard to fence in."

They're amazed to hear about the ships and fishing industry, the farming and reloading operation – the power in the museum, and the gristmill on the river that grinds corn into meal. "Like all the camps up north combined," Dwight says.

"'Cept the Sanctuary. Sanctuary didn't produce shit. And we ain't got no extortioners." The bitter edge comes through his voice, and Dwight looks away.

"The mayor…" Sherry asks a little quietly. "How many wives does he have?"

"Just the one," Daryl says. He wonders how many the ruler of Williamsburg had, if that's still a question in Sherry's mind. "'S a good man. Competent. But the mayor's elected anyhow. New election come July. Could be someone else. Probably won't be though."

Dwight, spying the watchtower a half mile outside of Jamestown, stops suddenly and seizes his rifle.

"Shoulder it!" Daryl orders gruffly, and waves to the watchman who is spying them out with a pair of binoculars. It's Daniel, his old cell mate. Daniel lowers his binoculars and makes his way down the tower.

When they meet up with each other, Daryl tells him to signal back. "Two unkowns?" Daniel asks, looking Dwight and Sherry over.

"Yeah," Daryl says.

"We're not unknown to you," Sherry says nervously.

It's been years since he saw either one of them, and Dwight was always unpredictable. "Yeah," he insists. "Yeah, ya are." He jerks his head forward. "C'mon."


	88. Chapter 88

Carol's hands are coated with dirt as she works the weeds out of one of the communal garden plots. Daryl's familiar voice sounds it's "Hey" behind her, and she jumps to her feet and throws her arms around him, grateful to see him safely home. He doesn't seem to mind the dirt in his hair when she pushes him in for a kiss, but he does pull away because others are looking up from the garden. "Talk to ya a sec?"

She follows him away from the others, until they're standing not far from the pig pen. "Did you find the parents?" she asks quietly.

"Nah. Found people who knew 'em though. People we know."

" _Who_?"

"Dwight n' Sherry."

Confusion flickers across Carol's brow.

"Dwight was that Savior gave me information durin' the war," Daryl reminds her. "Sherry was his wife. One that let me go from the Sanctuary when Negan had me."

"You never mentioned a Sherry. There's so much you never told me about your time there."

Daryl swallows, as if he's afraid they're about to have a fight. "Sorry. Just don't like – "

"- You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. It's just a part of your history that's dark to me. I thought Dwight died in the war?"

"No. I uh…I let 'em go. Told 'em to find his wife 'n never come back."

"And they know Sweetheart's parents?" asks Carol, her nerves tensing in preparation for any revelation.

"They're dead." He tells her the whole story.

"And Dwight and Sherry," she asks slowly. "Do _they_ want the baby?"

"They'd take if it needed raisin' 'n providin' for. But they ain't in love with 'er like you already are."

Carol flushes at his seeing-through-her. "I just…"

He puts a hand on her arm and looks her in the eyes. "Didn't quite hear what ya said to me the other night. Think I processed it later. Ya wanna to adopt this baby. Don't ya? Be its mamma?"

Carol's afraid to admit the yearning so openly, afraid he won't feel the same, but she admits it anyway. "Yes," she says firmly.

"Ain't sure what kind of daddy I'll make. But…'m willin' to try. If ya promise to keep me in line? Tell me when 'm fuckin' up?"

A happy laugh splurts from Carol's lips and she throws her arms around his neck and kisses him. When she pulls away, she assures him, "You _aren't_ going to. But uh…" She smirks. "Maybe you shouldn't say fuck quite so much around _her_?"

Daryl smiles.

[*]

Daryl knocks on the frame of the open door of the mayor's office. "Guard said ya wanted to see me?"

Garland waves him in and tells him to shut the door. Daryl sits in the chair opposite his desk, which isn't quite so scattered with papers as usual. The file folders are neatly stacked in one corner, and there's only a notebook open in front of him. "These people you brought in, you know them from before?"

"Yeah."

"Why weren't they a part of your old Alliance? Why were they out there on their own?"

Daryl gives him a truncated version of the story, including Dwight's role as Negan's right-hand man and his later assistance and betrayal of the Saviors.

Garland leans back in his chair, one arm outstretched and a hand resting on the desk. "I don't know about letting a man like that into Jamestown. It's sounds like he's turned and turned again. Can he be trusted to be loyal to _any_ people?"

"He's done bad things. Terrible things, tryin' to survie. And me and him ain't 'zactly gonna be friends if he lives here. But I don't think he's a threat to anyone. Think he'd rather serve a good man than a bad one, but he'll do whatever he's gotta do to keep his wife alive."

"Including standing by while she's taken into some man's harem? What the hell kind of husband allows that?"

"Dunno," Daryl admits, because it baffles him, too. "Think they was just both tryin' to survive. They knew they'd be tracked down if they tried to run. 'N it was Sherry's call to marry 'em."

"To save her husband."

Daryl nods.

"Would you let Carol join some man's harem to save _your_ life?"

"Hell no."

Garland drums his fingers on the desk. "You understand my concern about this man?"

"Yeah. Do. 'N I ain't gonna argue yer decision."

"The _council's_ decision," Garland clarifies.

"But yer the one told me – a kindness ain't never wasted. We took in some of them Saviors after the war. They became a part of the Alliance. Some of 'em, we had issues with. But others…they were loyal, 'n they worked hard. They became one of us. People can change. God knows I have. Used to be…" He sits forward in his chair. "When I first met Carol, was gonna rob 'er. Me 'n m' brother, was gonna rob 'er whole camp, 'n just leave 'em there…defenseless."

Garland looks surprised at this revelation. "But you didn't?"

"Nah. Shit happened 'n m'brother disappeared 'n…things changed. I changed."

Garland seems to be mulling all this over, and his face darkens suddenly. "I sit here judging this man and his wife," he mutters, "but in some ways I'm more like Negan than Dwight."

" _What_?" Daryl spits. He can't imagine a man more _unlike_ Negan than Garland. Garland, a decidedly one-woman man who surrendered his own power after the mutiny to establish a democracy.

"Shannon married me to save her baby and her mother."

"Ya ain't _nothin'_ like Negan! Ya weren't collectin' wives, and ya weren't gonna put Shannon's mama in the yard with the walkers if she said no."

"But the captain might not have admitted her people. They'd gone to war with us. Killed fifteen of our own. She _could_ have said no to me, theoretically, but she _knew_ life would be harder for her if she did. She knew there was a higher possibility of ending up outside the gates of Jamestown. And even if she didn't end up out there, a new mother supporting a child and an elderly mother? It would have been hard. Very hard. It wasn't precisely a _free_ decision."

"Ain't the same, man. Ain't nowhere near the same."

Garland looks off into some corner of the office. "I could tell she was nervous, that first night I came to her. As if she wasn't entirely sure what I'd do. If I'd be gentle, or…" He shakes his head. "I wish I could wind back that clock, do it the right way. Date her for a few months, then get down on one knee and propose, and – "

"- Ya can't. 'S a messed up world we live in, 'n sometimes we gotta do things 'n less 'n perfect ways. She loves ya, man. 'N ya love 'er. Ya gotta let that shit go."

Garland sighs and rubs his face. "I used to feel less guilty about it because she really seemed to want me. But lately, she's seemed less interested. Even since I've been paying more attention and making more time for the family, she's still less interested than she used to be."

"Man, she's tired."

"I don't _just_ mean in sex. I mean in _me_. I know we've got the baby, and Gary, and now she's feeding Sweetheart, too, and she's exhausted, I get that…but...she was more interested in me after Gary was born. I guess sometimes I wonder if it's really her being tired, or if she's just tired of _me_. We're so different in terms of personality. And I wonder sometimes if after she married me - because she had to - she just made the most of it for a while…but now that we're not in that world, now that we've re-imagined Jamestown…" He shakes his head. "I wonder if she regrets it."

Daryl shifts uncomfortably in his chair. He doesn't know how talk about women with other men. At least when it was Merle talking about women, it was shallow shit about their tits or asses, or complaints about their bitching, and Daryl could grunt his indifferent agreement. But this is real relationship shit and Garland's treating him like a serious friend, and he's probably expected to say something real. "Fuck, man, Shannon's crazy 'bout ya. Just…babies. Ya know." Daryl frowns at the lameness of his own encouragement. "Y'all need another date night." The term _date night_ falls like a foreign word from his lips. "Want me 'n Carol to watch the kids 'n y'all go to the Tavern tonight?"

Garland shakes his head. "We're going to have a Council meeting tonight to discuss admission of this Dwight and Sherry. Shannon will have to be there, too."

"Then after the meetin'. Y'all can stop by the Tavern."

"She'll need to feed VanDaryl and Sweetheart before they go to bed."

"She can pump 'fore the meetin' 'n leave us -"

"- But then she'll be engorged and – "

"- Shit, man, 'm tryin' to help!"

Garland scratches his head. "I know. I know you are." He looks up for a while, which he does when he's thinking. "Sweetheart slept through the night last night. Now that she's been eating regularly, maybe she'll keep doing that. VanDaryl only woke up _once_ last night." He looks at Daryl. "Feel free to say no, but, maybe…would you and Carol consider taking Gary camping this Saturday? Just leave the babies with us? We could have dinner at home, just the two of us, and once the babies are asleep for the night, we could have the cabin to ourselves. We could be alone but not have to go anywhere."

"Campin'?" Daryl asks.

"I know it sounds odd. We all did so much camping in the beginning to survive. But Gary's never been camping. He's never been outside that cabin except to sleep over at a friend's hut or cabin. It would be _exciting_ for him."

"Where?" Daryl asks.

"Well, I don't want you taking him outside the fences. Not at this age. But maybe you could set up a tent on that little island with the light house? It's clear of walkers. It just has a bit of wildlife. Some woods."

"Yeah. Sure. Teach 'em to light a fire 'n shit."

"Keep an eye on him though with the fire thing. He's – "

"Yeah. Know what he's like."

"Like the Energizer Bunny," Garland says. "All over the place and always into things. You remember that commercial?"

Daryl nods. "Just keeps goin'." He slumps a little in his chair. "Listen, man, we're gonna be out of yer hair soon. Be done with that cabin by August at the latest."

"I didn't mean to make you feel unwelcome when I said we could have the cabin to - "

"-Nah, but, 's crowded. Y'all need yer space. For yer own family. 'M tryin' to get it done. Fast as I can. 'N when we do...we're gonna take Sweetheart with us. Give ya even more space."

"What now?"

"Carol'll bring 'er over to yer place to nurse 'til we can switch 'er to cow's milk, but we'll keep 'er with us. Thought we'd adopt 'er, ya know? 'Cause we know ya got two already. 'N third ain't gonna be easy. 'N that way she ain't gonna end up at the orphanage."

Garland smiles. "She'll be fortunate to have you for parents. You need to submit a formal adoption request to the council, in writing." He opens a file cabinet drawer. "Then the council will call you in for an interview. It's just a formality. I'm sure they'll approve the adoption." He pulls out a folder and opens it and begins paging through the papers. "No. These are all sponsorship forms. People don't _fully_ adopt often." He closes the folder, puts it back, and pulls out another one. "Here you go." He hands Daryl a handwritten sheet of notebook paper. "That's the last copy. I'll have to get the copyist to make another from the master next time."

There's a knock on the door. Garland waves through the open blinds of the window, and Sheriff Earl opens the door. "I'm starting the interview, Mayor, if you want to join me."

Garland rolls back his chair. "I will. And I need to brief you on a few things first." He follows the sheriff out of his office, leaving Daryl looking at the adoption form.

Daryl reads over the questions, looks at the blanks they have to fill in, and suddenly the decision feels far more real.

 _Fuck_ , Daryl thinks. _'M gonna be a daddy._


	89. Chapter 89

Daryl pushes off the living room floor, and the chair rocks. He tries to make a silly face at Sweetheart, but she just narrows her eyes and gives him a look that seems to say – _don't bullshit me._ So he glowers instead, and when he does, she laughs. "She's laughin'!" he exclaims in surprise.

Carol, who is sitting on the couch with the adoption form on top of a book and a pencil in one hand, smiles. "She does that now."

"Laughin' at me I think. Ya girls are always laughin' at me."

"Because you're adorable."

VanDaryl makes a loud squealing noise from where he lies on his back on the deerskin rug. Gary, who is on his elbows and stomach looking down at his little brother, giggles. "Vandy, gwab my nose!" he orders.

"He can't grab things quite yet, sweetie," Carol tells him. Shannon and Garland are at the closed-door council meeting to deliberate on whether or not to admit Dwight and Sherry, and the Dixons are watching all the kids. "Pookie, come help me fill this out."

Daryl sits beside her on the couch and sets Sweetheart on her bottom on the floor between his feet. She falls forward, landing on her hands, and then gets on her knees, too, and begins to rock in place, as if she wants to launch herself forward, but she doesn't. "When they crawl?" he asks. "Wasn't Judith crawlin' by now?"

"Anywhere from six to ten months is normal," Carol says. "She doesn't look quite ready to go yet. When did Hershel crawl?"

"Dunno. Don't think he did. Think he went straight to walkin'."

He peers at the form as she writes in _Carol Dixon_ under adoptive mother's name and _Daryl Dixon_ under adoptive father's name. It still gives him a flutter of pride and nervousness every time he sees or hears her name attached to his. The tip of her pencil pauses on the blank beside _Child's name_ and she glances at him.

"Parents called 'er Alexandra, after 'er mama. Mean, guess we ain't gotta use that name…"

"I think we should, if it's her given name. She should have something to tie her to her biological parents. Did she have a middle name?"

"Dunno. Don't think so."

Carol writes _Alexandra Sweetheart Dixon_ in the blank. "Okay?

Daryl smiles and nods. He was planning to call her Sweetheart anyway. He would't be able to stop himself if he tried. But it's good she has a real first name now, for official purposes, and because he doesn't want random boys calling her Sweetheart one day. _Boys._ There are going to boys interested in his little girl one day. _Shit._

The next line asks – _Where do you plan to house the child?_

Carol writes – _in our cabin, which is currently under construction and should be completed in_ – She glances at Daryl.

"August. At the latest."

The next question asks if the adoptive parents have any other children who will be living with them. Carol answers no and moves on. Then it asks if they've raised children in the past, and, if so, for how long. Carol puts down information about Henry and Sophia on that line. She looks tense as she writes Sophia's name, and Daryl puts a comforting arm around her shoulders. She writes N/A on the line after adoptive father's previous children. "Unless there's something I don't know about," she teases.

"Nah," he replies. "Less there's sometin' _I_ don't know about."

Carol frowns.

"Sorry. Dumb joke."

She looks at him pointedly. "Is it possible there's something you don't know about?"

"Nah. Mean. Ain't likely. Always slapped one on."

Gary looks up from VanDaryl and his little forehead crinkles with confusion.

"Little ears," Carol reminds Daryl.

"Raincoat," Daryl tells Gary. "When 's rainin', always slap on a raincoat so's I won't get wet."

"Unca Dawhall, you don't have a waincoat!"

"Got a poncho. Close enough."

Carol chuckles. Sweetheart rolls on her back and looks up at them. "We're adopting you," Carol whispers down to her. Her blue eyes widen at the sound of Carol's voice.

The next few lines on the adoption form require them both to initial a number of statements:

 __ _ I/we understand I/we will have to work an extra 5 hours a week for my child's schooling beginning at the age of 3._

 __ _ I/we understand I/we will have to work an extra 10 hours a week for my child's rations from age 3-5._

 __ _ I/we understand I/we will have to work and extra 15 hours a week for my child's rations from age 6-12._

 __ _ I/we understand our child will be expected to begin working an apprenticeship, in exchange for his/her own rations, at age 13, but I/we will continue to provide housing until at least age 17._

 __ _ I/we understand I/we will be responsible for any civil or criminal fines my/our child incurs prior to the age of 17._

 __ _ I/we consent to three inspections of our living quarters by the Sheriff in the first year after adoption, at unannounced intervals._

"The hell?" Daryl asks when Carol hands him the pencil to sign the last one.

"It's probably to make sure the kids are being well provided for an there's nothing amiss, no abuse or anything."

"Don't want some lawman forcin' his way in m' door whenever the hell he wants."

"I'm sure he'll knock," Carol reassures him. "And it's only three times, and only during the first year."

Daryl's throat rumbles. "They think 'm gonna beat m'kid?"

"They don't think anything, Pookie. They're being cautious for the protection of the kids. You of all people should appreciate that."

Daryl glowers, but he initials the line.

Sweetheart rolls over onto her stomach again, and then onto her back, and then onto her stomach. "You better snatch up your daughter before she hits the bookcase," Carol warns him, and Daryl does.

[*]

When Shannon and Garland return to the cabin, Daryl is tucking Gary in, Sweetheart is sitting up entirely on her own - the first time Carol has seen her do so - on the deer skin rug and playing with a wooden stacking toy, and Carol is comforting a fussing VanDaryl who is ready for his bedtime snack. Shannon plucks up the baby from Carol's arms and sits down in the rocking chair to plop him on her breast. Garland hands her the nursing blanket that is draped over the crib railing and goes to say goodnight to Gary.

"Were the boys much trouble?" Shannon asks.

"None at all," Carol tells her.

When the men emerge from the bedroom, Daryl sits on the couch beside Carol and Garland slumps into the armchair opposite Shannon. He watches her nurse quietly for a while, as the blanket moves slightly. "You're beautiful," he says.

"I'm haggard is what I am," Shannon replies.

"Daryl and Carol are going to take Gary camping on Saturday."

Carol looks at Daryl with a raised eyebrow, and he says, "Was gonna tell ya."

"So we'll just have the babies," Garland says. "That will be fun, won't it?"

"I'm sure Gary will have a lot of fun with his aunt and uncle," Shannon replies.

"I meant fun for us."

Shannon laughs. When Garland frowns, Shannon says, "Oh, baby, I'm sorry. I didn't know you were serious."

"Ya admit 'em?" Daryl asks. "Dwight 'n Sherry?"

"Probationary admission," Garland answers, still frowning a little. He turns his attention from Shannon to Daryl. "But no weapons for five weeks. The council will re-evaluate after five weeks, and either return their weapons, or boot them out, depending on how it went."

"Is that typical?" Carol asks. They got their weapons back right away, the day they were admitted.

"No," Garland replies, "but there was some discomfort with Dwight given that he helped torture Daryl."

"What?" asks Carol, looking at Daryl wide eyed. She learned he was tortured the first time they were in Jamestown, and he was on the stand, but Dwight's part in it is new information to her.

"'S Negan's right hand man back then," Daryl mutters.

Later, when they're in their bedroom, and they're both stripping off their gear and getting ready for bed, Carol says, "We don't talk much about what happened in the time we spent apart, do we?"

"Ya didn't wanna tell me much 'bout them girls neither, did ya?"

"It wasn't an accusation. Just an observation." She drops her pants, leaves her undershirt on, and slides under the sheet. Daryl, who is in only his boxers now, cranks the fan. The oil lamp gently illuminates the room. Daryl gets under the sheets beside her, lays his head on the pillow with his arm bent behind it, and looks up at the shadows painted by the whirring blades.

"You said you let Dwight go,"" Carol asks. "Were you in a position to kill him?"

"Yep."

"Did you _want_ to kill him?"

"Yep."

"Why didn't you?"

"'Cause he begged. 'N 'cause his wife was out there alone and he was gonna try to find 'er. 'N Sherry helped me escape. I ain't never had nothin' 'gainst her."

"Do you still want to kill him?"

Daryl doesn't answer.

She turns her head on the pillow to look in his eyes.

"Nah," he answers finally. "Don't want to kill no one anymore. Less they're tryin' to kill me. But I don't _like_ 'em. Man killed Denise."

"The veterinarian at Alexandria?"

"Yeah. Tara's girl."

Carol rolls completely on her side and lays an open palm on Daryl's bare chest. The sheet is at their waists. "Does Tara know you let him go?"

"Mhm. Told 'er 'ventually. But he better never show his face 'round 'er."

"Well, we won't take him on the trade trip." She's pretty confident that's happening now, at least once a year. "And I guess we won't be inviting them to dinner at our new cabin when it's built."

"Hell no."

She settles her chin on his shoulder and raises her eyes to him, "Who _will_ we be inviting?"

"Huh?" Daryl asks.

"Garland and Shannon of course," Carol says.

"A'ight," he agrees.

"How about Dante and Inola?"

"Guess..." he answers uncertainly. "If ya want."

"I think they finally got together last night during the storm."

"Yeah?" Daryl asks skeptically.

"I think they could make a good couple friend for us." When he doesn't answer, she asks, "You don't like Dante?"

"'S a'ight, I guess. Kind of reminds me of T-Dog."

"In personality, I can see that. In build he's more like Tyresse was. But he's handsomer than either." Daryl frowns and Carol chuckles. "It's just an observation. Maybe we should have Gunther Hamilton over sometime, too. I get the feeling he's going to be a major political player."

"How often we gonna have to have dinner with people?" Daryl asks in alarm.

Carol rolls on her back with a sigh. "Yeah, I guess you aren't much for entertaining. It's just I always wanted people over, and Ed would never let me. He didn't like me making friends. And I never had my own cabin with Ezekiel. If we ate with others, it was always a big banquet. We were King and Queen, so it was never really..." She shrugs. "We never had a quiet evening at home with just a couple of friends. We were never close to anyone in that way."

"Jerry and Nabila?" Daryl asks.

"That was as close as we came, but Jerry was always Ezekiel's echo...And Nabila was always pleasant to me, but we never talked about anything serious. I don't know how to explain. It wasn't like it is with Garland and Shannon. I'd like more friendship. Maybe I used to shy away from it because of all the people we lost. But I don't want to shy away from it anymore. We've got a baby now. She's going to need all the extended family she can get."

"A'ight, but...just how many dinners are we talkin' 'bout here?"

"I understand you're anti-social. I'll be mindful of that." She rolls toward him again. "But _occasionally_? Could we have someone over? It also might be kind of politically necessary."

"Fuck politics. But if ya want someone over 'cause ya like 'em...have 'em over. Just...not more 'n once a week?"

"Okay," she agrees.

"'N don't 'spect me to put m'napkin in m' lap."

Carol chuckles and kisses him. "So I guess we're camping Saturday?" she asks. "Seriously, _camping_?"

"Garland wants the cabin to themselves. 'S been feelin' like maybe Shannon's tired of 'em. Like maybe she regrets marryin' 'em."

Carol's head jerks up. "What? Why?" When Daryl explains briefly, she settles her head on his shoulder again and snuggles up. "Does Shannon know he feels like that?"

"Dunno."

"I have noticed she doesn't compliment him all the time like she did when we were here the first time. It' s because her attention is on the kids. They can be draining, two that close together in age. Husbands always get displaced a little. Garland has to come to grips with that. But men do need a lot of ego stroking."

"Pfft."

"It's true. It's not as if you haven't had your insecurities that need reassuring."

"Ain't m' ego I need stroked." He takes her hand, which is on his chest, and guides it downward.

She pulls her hand out from beneath his and slaps it playfully on his stomach. "Stop."

"Ain't like you don't need it, too."

"I'm just not in the mood right now."

"Mean the reassurin'," he says.

"I used to."

" _Used_ to. So ya don't need me to say yer gorgeous. Or a fantastic cook. Or strong. Great shot. Smart as a whip. Though I ain't never really understood why people think whip's 're smart." Carol laughs. She raises her head to kiss him again. When she pulls away, he asks, "Us raisin' Sweetheart...that don't mean yer gonna stop payin' 'tention to me?"

"No," she promises. "But I might not have _as much_ attention to give. Neither will you."

"Don't need much 'tention anyhow."

"No?" she asks. "You don't need me to tell you how good-looking you are? What a great hunter you are? How you make me feel safe and loved and protected? How much I like your muscles..." She traces the sinews of his chest. "How sexy you are?" She slips a hand in his boxers and wraps her hand gently around him before making a single stroke.

He hisses and looks at her with darkened eyes. "Thought ya weren't in the mood."

"Not really. But maybe I'll just take care of you." She kisses him as she continues to play with him, but feeling and hearing his excitement soon excites her, and they end up making love and falling asleep in a tangled mass of limbs and sheets.


	90. Chapter 90

Dante inspects the fence as they hike the perimeter, while Carol keeps an eye on the woods for trouble, but they've hiked the entire west and north side without having to peel a walker from the pikes. Still, the task will allow Carol to put in three extra hours to help Shannon and Garland. "So..." she asks casually, "did you keep Inola from being scared of the storm?"

Dante flushes slightly and rounds the corner of the fence to the east side. "Turns out she's not really afraid of storms."

"So what's that mean going forward?"

"It means I'm an asshole who sleeps with his best friend's wife."

"His _dead_ best friend's wife," Carol clarifies.

Dante sighs. "Maybe I wouldn't feel so damn guilty about it if I wasn't half in love with her when he was alive," Dante admits.

"Oh."

"That's just between you and me."

Carol nods. "So what now?"

"Inola wants me to move in with her." He pauses because they've finally come across a walker. Carol drives her knife into the side of its head and then helps Dante peel it off and drag it away.

"And?" Carol asks as they walk on.

"I've got two roommates in my hut...it's crowded." He shrugs. "And she has room. So I guess now I just learn to live with the guilt. Because God knows I'm not going to be able to keep myself away from her after last night." A sheepish grin covers his face.

Carol smiles at his happiness.

"She's uh...breaking it off with Gunther this afternoon," he says.

"I think he's prepared for that," Carol assures him.

"It's not like he fell head over heels for Inola. He just respects her, and I'm sure he certainly wouldn't have minded getting laid. But he's still in love with that dead whore. Now _that_ I'll never get." They're at the west gate now, which he unlocks and holds open for her.

"The heart wants what the heart wants," Carol says.

"Ain't that the truth."

[*]

When Carol goes back to the cabin for lunch, VanDaryl is napping in his crib, and Shannon has just finished nursing Sweetheart. "She didn't stay on long," Shannon tells her. "And she's down to feeding four times a day. I'm not sure that's really enough. She just _thinks_ it is because her little stomach shrunk when she wasn't being fed."

"Maybe we should try her on solids," Carol suggests. "Get her some more calories."

"Probably. I started Gary at six months. And she's seven, isn't she?"

"Yes," Carol replies.

"I have about an ounce of breast milk in that cooler. You want to whip her up some real thin grits and mix it in? That's what I started Gary on."

Shannon makes them lunch while Carol sits Sweetheart on her lap at the table and offers her a small spoonful of the thin grits she prepared. The baby's eyes light up big and wide when she takes her first bite, and she squeals with excitement, but half of it dribbles out of her mouth. Sweetheart grabs the empty spoon from Carol and tries to shove it in her mouth. "I think she likes them." Carol takes the spoon back, dips it into the grits, and gives the baby another little bite after wiping her face.

"Have you dropped off the adoption papers?" Shannon asks.

"Garland took them in for me this morning when he went to the office."

When Sweetheart is done eating, Carol returns her to the floor to play - which won't be so easy to do once she's crawling - and has lunch with Shannon.

"So...camping?" Shannon says. "That was a strange idea of Garland's. Gary's a little _young_ for _camping_."

"Oh, he'll love it," Carol says. "Daryl will make it fun. I think Garland just wants you two to have the cabin mostly to yourselves."

Shannon sighs. "Oh, I know. He's going to expect _real_ sex. He's only gotten it once since VanDaryl was born. I mean, he's not entirely _deprived_. He's had his weekly blowjob." Carol no longer feels embarrassed at Shannon's predictably detailed conversations. "And I don't mind giving him a special, high quality blowjob on Saturday, but, honey, I am _so_ tired. I don't want to put in the effort for energetic sex. VanDaryl got up twice last night. Right when I thought I had him down to once."

"I don't think it's just sex he wants," Carol tells her. "I think he's feeling a little...uncertain about your regard for him."

"What? Why? Did Garland say something to you?"

"No..."

"To Daryl?" When Carol doesn't immediately answer, Shannon asks, "What did he tell Daryl?"

"You two got married under unusual circumstances. And Daryl thinks maybe Garland's not so sure that you would want to do it all over again under _today's_ circumstances."

"Why would he think that? I'd do it under _any_ circumstances. Garland's an excellent husband and father. A moral man, smart, considerate, handsome..."

"You should tell him that."

Shannon sets down her water glass. "I've told him those things. A hundred times!"

"Have you told him _lately_?"

"Maybe...I don't know."

"Have you told him you'd marry him under different circumstances? If you _weren't_ pregnant, if you _weren't_ afraid of being outside the gates of Jamestown?"

"Not in so many words..." Shannon shakes her head and sighs. " _Men._ "

Carol laughs.

"And here I thought _I_ was the one feeling neglected with all the work he was doing, until you two helped out and gave us some family time. But I guess we _did_ spend most of that extra time on the kids and only a little of it on each other. And we've been sleeping apart. Not because we're mad at each other or anything. Just because I was trying not to wake Garland and Gary for the feedings."

"Well, I hope the babies sleep well for you so you can have time for each other Saturday night. And Daryl and I will be out of your hair, too."

"I've never had a successful marriage before," Shannon confesses. "My first marriage fell apart, the one before the Great Sickness. I blamed it on him, the cheating bastard, but really, I was so caught up in my own world and activities that I didn't even notice how often he was out at _meetings_. Then Gary's father...that wasn't even a real marriage. That was a protection compact. That camp was dysfunctional. There was probably one random rape a week. So if you had a man...you had protection. And I saw a man who was strong and owned two guns, and didn't seem rough toward women, so..." She shrugs. "I made sure I became his wife."

"And given that that _was_ your last marriage," Carol suggests, "and given why you _initially_ married Garland...can you maybe see why Garland's concerned you might see him in a more practical than romantic light?"

"At first, sure, but I thought we were beyond that, that he understood how much I love him. I mean, I thought I was just sex and housekeeping to him when he married _me_ , but I figured out I meant more to him than that. It's been over three years! If I wanted to, I could have walked away easily."

"Really?" Carol asks. "With two kids?"

"I could have done it before he knocked me up with the second one, anyway." Shannon pushes her lunch plate forward. "Good Lord! I wonder if he didn't forget to pull out _on purpose_. So I'd have a reason to stay." She shakes her head. "No, he's too honest for that kind of manipulation. I just make it hard to be disciplined."

Carol laughs. "Well, I'm happy for the failure. My godson is adorable."

In his crib, VanDaryl lets out a waking cry.

" _Sometimes_ ," Shannon says with a smirk.

[*]

Daryl and Mitch stroll up to the gates of Jamestown, weapons shouldered and each holding one rope of a drag sled weighted down by a deer. Dog barks up, and the gates roll open. There's a horse and cart already out front of the museum, that has recently returned from a scavenging run. The man, whom Daryl only knows vaguely, seems to have scored few building supplies, but there's room in the cart for the deer, so he offers to deliver it to the butcher for them and heads around the museum to the settlement.

Daryl and Mitch pass through the museum. They nod to Santiago's son Raul coming in from the other side. "Which way's the infirmary?" the young man asks them, not quite meeting their eyes. He's a shifty kid, Daryl thinks, but that might have more to do with his being shell shocked than his being dishonest. Although Carol did catch the kid stealing eggs. Daryl just hopes letting him off doesn't come back to bite her in the ass. But Santiago, Raul, and Daryl are the only ones who know.

Daryl points down the hall and asks, "Ya sick?"

"No, I'm reporting for duty." Raul almost meets Daryl's eyes now. "I used to study under the apothecary in Williamsburg. So the doc's going to put me to work making medicines."

"I'm Mitch." Mitch holds out his hand, and Raul shakes it reluctantly, not letting his hand linger long in Mitch's. Daryl supposes he was supposed to introduce them, but he never thinks of those sort of things.

"And you're...?"

"Raul," the young man answers. "I'm uh...Santiago's son."

"Oh, yeah, I heard about them finding you," Mitch replies.

"Ya see Dwight 'n Sherry?" Daryl asks the young man.

"Yeah," Raul answers. "I didn't know them well, but I'm glad some others made it out of Williamsburg alive. I had no idea that baby I rescued had Alexandra and Dennis for parents! I wish we'd found each other after Williamsburg got overrun. Things...might have been different."

"Things 're gonna be different now," Daryl tells him.

When Raul has moved on and Mitch and Daryl spill outside the museum, Mitch says, "Kid seems a little skittish."

"Got imprisoned in his last camp," Daryl answers. "Got raped by the leader."

" _Oh_."

"He killed 'em all."

Mitch whistles. "And the council gave him his weapons back?

"Hell, they had it comin'. He poisoned 'em, 'cause they was gonna eat Sweetheart."

" _What?_ " Mitch shakes his head. "Never mind. I don't think I want to know anymore."

As they step onto the docks, they near a bench where Sarah sits talking to Captain Cummins

"Captain," Mitch says simply.

"Mitch," the captain replies by way of greeting. "Daryl."

Mitch glances at Sarah and then back at the captain and walks on. His pace has quickened, and Daryl has to catch up. "Think they'll get married?" Mitch asks.

"Dunno. Santiago thinks the cap'ns gay." He's not sure why he says that. It's none of his business and he's no gossip, but it just kind of comes out.

Mitch looks out at the river. "Well if he is, he should probably tell Sarah. That's not really fair to her."

They walk on in silence, and step off the docks onto the dirt path that winds its way to the settlement. Dwight nears them and Daryl tenses at his presence. The old anger runs up his nerves like pulsing electricity on a wire. "Can we talk?" Dwight asks.

"Catch up with ya later," Daryl tells Mitch, who walks on.

Dwight leans back against the two rails of the low fence marking a field. "Did they take your weapons when you moved here?" he asks.

"They'll give 'em back if ya keep your nose clean."

Dwight glances over his shoulder at the workers in the field. "I get the feeling people don't trust me."

"Why the hell should they?" Daryl growls. The image of Denise - with that arrow in her eye - _still talking_ \- flares up in his mind.

"All right. Fair enough. But they didn't even leave me my knife. I don't feel safe without it."

"'S safe inside these gates. Ain't no walkers get in here. Where's Sherry?"

"She's working in the laundry room. I'm on my way to join her. They had me dusting the chapel. They have us on light duty until we can fatten up, and then they they plan to put us in the fields."

"Mhm." Dwight's about fifteen pounds lighter than when Daryl last saw him, and he was never a stocky guy.

"How's the baby? How's little Alexandra?"

"'S good. Me 'n Carol, we're gonna adopt her." Daryl says it firmly, as though staking his claim. If Dwight and Sherry want her, now's the time to lodge a protest. Dwight doesn't.

"Good. Can we see her? Sherry wants to see her."

Daryl guesses he can't deny Sherry that. She knew the mother well, after all. "Come by the mayor's place this evenin'. After six, 'fore eight."

"And where's that? Is it the big row house in the settlement part?"

"Pffft. Nah. Four families live in that row house. Mayor's in a little cabin. Not far from the school house. Awnin' and two rockin' chairs out front. Stayin' with 'em 'til I get our cabin built."

Dwight scratches the back of his neck. He still looks strange to Daryl without the long hair. The iron-burned cheek is more prominent without that shield. "So...the mayor here? He doesn't take a lot for himself?"

"He doesn't take shit for himself. Gets two-thirds rations for his work as mayor. 'S all. Rest of the council gets half rations."

"Wow. They get less than regular people?"

"They make it up with other work. Council ain't full-time." But it's close, Daryl thinks, and Garland _does_ work more than twenty hours as mayor, even if it's desk work.

Dwight rests a hand on the fence post. "Listen. There's been a lot of men hitting on Sherry already."

The nervousness in his voice stabs a sympathetic nerve in Daryl. "They ain't gonna touch 'er, less'n she wants 'em to," Daryl assures him. "Wouldn't be tolerated. Got law 'n order. Just...ain't gotta lot of women here. Men gonna notice 'er."

"Do you have that problem? With men coming onto Carol?"

"Nah. Carol'd shut that shit right down. 'N I got a certain reputation here."

"Yeah?" Dwight asks with a crooked smile. "How do _I_ get that reputation?"

"You don't wanna do what ya gotta to do to get it. Ya wanna lay low 'til ya get yer weapons back, 'n the lay low 'til ya get full citizenship. But if anyone's harassin' Sherry, she's just gotta tell Sheriff Earl." Or Dwight could grow a set of balls, Daryl thinks, and protect his wife, the way he didn't against Negan. Not that Daryl thinks there are any Negans in Jamestown. "Where they got ya stayin'?" He's pretty sure the Kingdom took up all available beds.

"They put us in an alcove in the laundry room. We're just using our sleeping bags for now, but it's not bad. There's an electric fan, so it's not too hot. And we have shelving for our stuff, a little card table. We can cook stuff in the museum's breakroom, they said, with the kettle and hot pot and microwave there. I'm told I can buy a mattress from storage. Buy supplies and build a bed frame. So I'll do all that."

"If ya need help with the bed frame, Dante's a carpenter. Lumberjack too. He'll do any damn thing for a smoke."

"Thanks." Dwight nods. "And thanks for bringing us here. I know you didn't have to. I know you didn't _want_ to. You could have left us out there, and it would have served me right."

"Damn right it would of," Daryl mutters. "But Sherry don't deserve that. 'N I guess yer a package deal." He walks on up the path, leaving Dwight to return to the museum.


	91. Chapter 91

Gary runs out of the bedroom holding a brown sack with furry head that trails its body behind him. "Unca Dahwall, we campin'!"

"Uh, yeah, we are," Daryl tells him as he pries the collar of his shirt from Sweetheart's grasp and picks up her favorite set of plastic keys from the end table beside the arm chair where he sits. She gurgles and puts the key ring straight in her mouth. "But not 'til tomorrow."

The smell of the broth from the venison stew rises and curls toward his nose as Carol chops carrots. Shannon is asleep on the couch with VanDaryl on her chest.

"Look!" Gary holds up his sleeping bag. "Lion. ROAR!"

Daryl lifts up the drooping lion-shaped pillow-head attached to the sleeping bag. "Yep, it's a lion all right."

"Gonna woast mawshmallows!"

"How do you know about marshmallows?" Daryl asks. Judith's never had one, though she did have a very stale Circus Peanut candy when she was three, not that you could tell the difference. As Rick quipped, they'd been stale forever.

Garland, who has also emerged from the bedroom, says, "There's a man who makes them from his monthly ration of pig fat. He sells them for tea leaves, because his wife loves her tea. I bought a dozen for your trip."

Gary glowers, puts one hand on his little hip, and stares at his father. "You said twelve, Daddy!"

"A dozen _is_ twelve, son."

The angry little pose relaxes immediately. "Oh."

VanDaryl stirs on his mother's chest, whimpers, and opens his eyes.

"Vandy, wakey, wakey," Gary says and drops his sleeping bag to trot over to his little brother.

"Shhh!" Garland warn him as he plucks the stirring baby from Shannon's chest. "Don't wake your mother. Let her sleep until dinner's ready."

[*]

Carol puts away the cleaned dinner dishes in the hutch while Daryl lies on his side on the deer skin rug and pretends to eat Sweetheart's toes, an act that sends her squealing with peels of laughter. The sound sends a jolt of affection for both her husband and the baby rushing through Carol's heart. A knock-knock-KNOCK sounds on the door. Garland lays down his novel, open, over the arm of the rocking chair, and stands. Shannon shifts the nursing blanket over VanDaryl to cover herself a little more fully. "Who could that be?" she asks.

"I hope it's not Sheriff Earl with some major issue _I'm_ going to have to deal with," Garland grumbles. "I already worked from six to five today."

"Oh, shit!" Daryl mutters as he scrambles to his feet, leaving Sweetheart forlorn and crying. He bends down, picks her up, and settles her on his hip, and she stops fussing. "Forgot to tell ya. Said Dwight 'n Sherry could come see the baby."

Garland swings open the door. "Come on in," he tells the couple, and Dwight and Sherry step cautiously inside.

Carol shuts the doors to the hutch, turns, crosses her arms over her chest, and surveys the man who apparently helped to torture her husband when he was captive in the Sanctuary. She plans to hate Dwight immediately, but she's distracted from the emotion by the pathetic picture before her. Drooping, burned skin deforms the entire left side of Dwight's face. His pants barely stay on his hips, despite the tight belt he's pulled around them and the extra notch he's made in the leather. His less-thin wife, whom he's clearly been going without food to feed, clings to him with one finger hooked through his belt loop, as though afraid to be separated from him in a sea of unwelcome strangers.

"Hello," Sherry says quietly. Her eyes settle immediately on Shannon as the only possible friendly harbor in the room.

Shannon nods to her. "Welcome to our cabin. It's not much to look at."

"It's beautiful," Sherry says. "Very homey."

Garland looks Dwight over warily and steps aside into the living room while Carol flanks Daryl's side near the fireplace as if providing defense in battle. "I'm Carol," she tells them. "Daryl's wife."

"Nice to meet you," Sherry says. "This is my husband Dwight."

"I'm familiar with the name," Carol says coolly. She knows Dwight gave them useful information in their war against the Saviors, but she thinks it would have been more useful if he had simply assassinated Negan. Surely as Negan's right hand man, he had the opportunity. Of course Rick had the opportunity, too, probably more than once, and yet he didn't seize it. She was late to leadership, but she never really understood the way the men fought that war, as if they preferred public speeches and chest bumping to quiet, surprise victory.

Dwight and Sherry turn their attention to the baby, who is looking at them in wide-eyed fascination.

"Hi, Alexandra," Sherry says softly. "Hey there, Lexi!" It's the voice the baby must recognize. Sweetheart holds out her arms to Sherry, which causes Carol to tense. "Can I hold her?"

"Don't think she's gonna give me a choice," Daryl mutters as the baby tries to squirm from his arms into Sherry's. Sherry gives her a big hug and a kiss on the forehead before handing her back to Daryl. "I'm surprised she remembered me," she says. "I didn't think babies had much memory, and it's been over two weeks now."

Sweetheart looks over Sherry's shoulder toward the door as if anticipating another arrival, and it breaks Carol's heart to think she might be looking for her mother. "Come here, sweetheart," she tells the baby and takes her from Daryl's hip to wrap her in a big embrace against her chest and shower kisses on her little face. Sweetheart squirms, pulls back, puts a palm on each of Carol's cheeks, and laughs.

"It looks like she's in good hands," Dwight says. "Daryl says you're adopting her?"

"We are," Carol tells them. "She'll be well cared for."

The couple, having been assured the baby is alive and well, makes a hasty retreat back to their quarters in the museum's laundry room. Carol eyes Daryl with concern, noticing the tense line in his jaw. "Glad that's over with?" she asks him.

"Mhmhm."

"I need to go get geared up for patrol." She hands the baby over to Daryl and heads to her room to clip on her handgun, magazine pouch, and knives. When she comes out again, Garland is on the couch with his arm around Shannon, and they're both reading books while VanDaryl leans swaddled against his father's side. It's a sight that warms Carol's heart. Gary is playing with Sweetheart on the rug, showing her how to stack wooden blocks which she keeps knocking down to his frustration.

"Would you walk me to the jailhouse?" Carol asks Daryl. It's where she always begins her patrol, because she picks up any notes the last patrolman left and gets a briefing from Earl before she starts her shift, which will last until lights out tonight.

"Uh...a'ight."

It's a strange request, she knows, and not one she's ever made before, but she wants to talk. When they exit the cabin, she begins to take the long way around. When she's sure they aren't in earshot of anyone outside, she asks, "What happened to Dwight's face?"

Daryl tells her about Negan's disciplinary measures.

"Jesus," she mutters. She's silent for a moment before she ventures, "What exactly did Dwight do to you?"

"Why ya wanna know?"

"I want to know what I'm dealing with."

Daryl sighs. "Buried all this."

"Okay," she says softly. "If that's what works for you. But you sure looked angry in there."

"Cause he stripped me naked, locked me in a cold, pitch black cell with nothin' but dirt 'n bugs in it. I couldn't get warm. Fed me dog food sandwiches, 'n played this loud song, same song, over 'n over 'n over...Said all this on the stand. Ya know all this."

"You said most of it on the stand. But I didn't know it was Dwight who did it."

"Dwight was Negan's henchman." Daryl clears his throat, looks away, and looks back at the ground. "That wasn't the worst though." Carol's entire body tenses at the admission, and she no longer wants to know what happened to him. But he tells her anyway, "Gave me a Polaroid photo of Glenn's head bashed in. Just left me to look at it."

Carol stops walking immediately. "Oh, Daryl."

His nostrils flare and his jaw clenches and he grabs onto her and buries his face in her neck. She holds him tightly and strokes his hair until his silent trembling stops. He pulls partly away with a long, shaky sigh. "Didn't think I wanted to ever tell ya that," he says. "But 's like..."

"A weight's lifted?"

"Yeah."

"That's because we can share each other's sorrow. That's what marriage is supposed to be, right? Half the sorrow and double the joy."

He smiles slightly. "Yeah? Never heard that."

"Well let's live it." She kisses him gently.

Harry, the young sailor, passing by on his way to his grandmother's cabin, shouts, "Get a room!"

Daryl pulls back and returns, "Fuck you look'in at!"

When Harry realizes it's the hero of the mutiny of 7 NE he's just teased, he turns an ashen white and hastens on.

"Who's that little piss ant?" Daryl mutters.

Carol chuckles. "That's Harry. He's a sailor, and he's a decent young man. He takes care of his grandmother who has dementia. Which reminds me I promised I'd visit her again. I will tomorrow before we go camping, I suppose."

"Harry? The one ya think Mitch is fuckin'?"

Carol nods.

"Nah!" Daryl exclaims. "What is he? Twelve?"

"He's twenty-five, Pookie."

"Mitch's forty!"

"May-December romances are not unheard of in these times," she reminds him. "People grow up faster and the options are scarcer."

"Hell they talk 'bout?" Daryl asks.

"I don't think they talk much. Did you talk much to the women you fucked?"

"Talk to ya all the damn time."

" _Before_ me," she says.

"Nah," he admits.

"It might not be him," Carol says. "It just seemed that way when I saw them together on the docks." She pats his shoulder. "I need to get to work. Kiss Sweetheart good night for me?"

"Mhmhm."

"You'll probably be gone hunting in the morning when I wake up?"

"Yeah. Just a few hours, though. Gotta pack up for the big campin' trip. Told Garland we'd be outta the cabin by the time he gets back from the office. Leave at two." He smiles, a bigger smile than she's used to seeing from him.

"What are you grinning about?" she asks.

"I ain't never been campin' for _fun_ before."


	92. Chapter 92

Carol's patrol eventually brings her to the tavern, which is crowded with about two dozen patrons. The rafters shake from the dancing, stomping, and bluegrass music of a six-piece band that calls itself Out of the Rubble, and talking and laughter floats in the air. Both waitresses are on duty and even Madam Linda is serving up a drink or two. Carol waits for a break in the music to check in with the tavern manager. She nods to Sarah on her way, who sits at the end of the bar, alone for the moment, eating a bowl of soup. A man leans an arm on the bar, says something to Sarah with a grin, and then walks away with a frown.

"Anything to report?" Carol asks as she comes to stand near Sarah and address the tavern manager on the other side of the bar.

"Tommy Two Toes skipped out on his tab again," Madam Linda says. "And this is the third day on his tab, which means - "

"- It's theft if he doesn't pay up tonight," Carol finishes for her. "I'll track him down and make sure he does. Any idea which way he went?"

"Either back to his bed in the barracks or toward the museum for the movie," Madam Linda answers.

"You look really nice," Carol tells her. The sixty-five-year old woman has put on a flattering dress and let out her silvery hair, which is usually in a bun. She looks at least five years younger and - maybe because of the pattern of the dress - five pounds less plump.

"See!" Candy exclaims as she walks nearby to refill a pint glass. "Carol also noticed you got all dolled up for your hot date with Gunther."

"I did _not_ get all dolled up, and I'm sure he doesn't see it as a date."

So Gunther did follow through with buying Linda a movie ticket instead of that pint.

Madam Linda looks at the clock on the wall behind the bar. "I need to get going." She serves a pint, takes off her apron, tucks it under the bar, and heads out. As she does, she passes by a table where the young sailor Harry sits laughing and talking to one of the twenty-something Kingdom women, Anika, who last Carol heard was seeing Inola's brother, though Harry is more her age. Carol's a bit puzzled by the young sailor's apparent interest, since she'd thought he was gay. But maybe he's just pretending to be "straight as an arrow" as Mitch grudgingly called him.

"Well I hope she gets laid tonight," Trisha, the other waitress, says as she pours three shots of moonshine. "Then she might not be so uptight about the accounts."

Candy snorts. "I don't know. Gunther's a catch. I don't see Mama Linda snaring him."

"The man hasn't had sex in a year," Trisha replies. "Anyone will probably do."

Candy glowers. "Well, he turned _me_ down! And I was offering for free to be _nice._ "

Trisha laughs, takes her tray, and heads off to serve.

Santiago leans against the bar beside Sarah. He's wearing dark blue jeans and a button-down, short sleeve, pale pink shirt, but no deputy's hat. His black hair falls in thick waves on his brow, almost masking one of his eyes. It's always stunned Carol a little to see masculine men wearing pink, maybe because Ed would rant over the effeteness of it all, and every time she would see a man comfortable in pink, she'd think of him as issuing a big _fuck you_ to her abusive husband. "So where's your boyfriend the captain?" Santiago asks.

"He had to work tonight," Sarah tells him.

"What work?" Santiago asks. "All the ships are docked."

"Paperwork."

"Huh. Paperwork?" Santiago glances around the bar. "And left you alone on a Friday night?"

"Give it a rest," she tells him.

"I'm just saying, if you had given me a _second_ chance...I'd never leave you alone on a Friday night."

Sarah shakes her head.

"At least dance with me once," Santiago insists. "When the music re-starts. You _did_ at least enjoy dancing with me on that date, didn't you?"

"Only because you can dance well," Sarah admits. "I mean, not as well as David, but..." She half turns on her stool and points her spoon at him. "Okay, but keep your hands where I can see them."

Santiago raises both his hands and grins. Then he glances over a the table where he left his son Raul. "Is that Councilman Barry's girl?" he asks a returning Trisha, who pulls a pint.

"It is," the waitress replies. "Rachel."

Carol glances at the teenage girl who has just sat down across from Raul and started talking to him. Santiago makes an uncertain noise in his throat as Raul, shyly meeting her eyes, pushes his pint over to her. "Is she even old enough to drink?" Santiago asks.

"Yeah, she's seventeen," Trisha tells him. "Of age to drink _and_ consent."

"Does her father know she's here?"

"Well I don't know, Santiago," Trisha tells him with a roll of her eyes. "I didn't consult her or her father on the matter. But I'd be more worried about her boyfriend than her father. Jackson's tough for a nineteen year old. He could probably beat _you_ up."

"I doubt that very much. But Raul doesn't need anymore trouble." Santiago straightens up and walks back over to his son's table, and as the music restarts, Carol exits the tavern in search of Tommy Two Toes.

Carol goes looking for Tommy Two Toes at the barracks and finds Gunther leaned back against the stone wall talking to two of the smokers, but not smoking himself. His dark stubble is a little thicker than usual, as if he forgot to shave today, and she wonders why he doesn't just grow a beard or goatee like so many other men. Maybe he thinks it would be peppered with too much gray for a man who tries to date thirty-five-year old women. The flame of a nearby tikki torch at the edge of the barracks flickers in his hazel eyes. "Aren't you supposed to be meeting Linda at the movie theater?" she asks.

"Shit," Gunther mutters. Then he looks her in the eyes and apologies for his language. Carol smiles with amusement at his old-fashioned apology. "I thought that was tomorrow night." He pulls out his pocket watch from the front pocket of his short-sleeve flannel, tucks it back in, and hurries off.

"He ain't gonna bring her flowers?" one of the smoking men asks with a sneer.

"Hell, I'd do her," the other mutters. "Anything at this point."

The first man slaps the second against the arm and nods toward Carol as though to say - watch your language in front of the woman. "What movie are they showing, deputy?" he asks her. As hard as she's tried to learn everyone's name, Carol doesn't know his, but she can judge he's a fisherman by the smell of him.

"I don't know."

"Some romantic comedy," the other man answers.

"Is Tommy Two Toes in there by chance?" Carol asks them. She doesn't like to stick her head in the barracks if she doesn't have to. One time when she did, there was just one man in there, among the several bunk beds, whacking off beneath a thin sheet.

"He in trouble?" one of the smokers asks cautiously.

"Not if he pays his tab tonight."

The man sticks his head in the open doorway of the barracks and yells, "Tommy! Deputy here to see you."

"I didn't do it!" comes a loud shout from within, and Tommy Two Toes takes off running out the barracks, past Carol, jetting toward the gates of the fort.

The smoking men laugh.

"It was just a skipped bar tab," Carol says incredulously.

"I think he smoked those mushrooms he found in the forest," the fisherman explains. "I'd let him run it out before you try to confront him."

Carol follows Tommy Two Toes to make sure he doesn't cause any damage in his high state. When she catches up with him, he's on the first plank of the dock, on his knees, panting. When he spies her, he screams, "Oh no! Not today, deputy!" and stands and jumps in the water, where he starts swimming manically toward the distant island with the light tower.

Carol sighs and begins untying a rowboat. Captain Cummins sticks his head out of the manhole of his cabin on one of the ships. "What's going on?" Carol explains and the captain says, "I'll help you row out and recover him." He pulls his head back inside and seems to be talking to someone inside, and then he emerges on deck and walks the stairs down to the dock. "Friday nights are crazy, aren't they?"

"Is that why you didn't want to go to the tavern with Sarah?" she asks him, glancing back to the window of his cabin, where she sees movement before the shade comes down.

The captain laughs slightly and smiles charmingly. "Let's go get your man before he drowns."

[*]

When Carol crawls into bed at eleven that night, after checking on Sweetheart in her crib, Daryl murmurs, rolls toward her, and swings an arm around her. "'S work?" he mutters sleepily.

"Quite the adventure. Tommy Two Toes skipped his tab, got high on shrooms, and tried to swim to China."

Daryl chuckles.

"And then later that night Jackson and Raul got in a fight in the tavern."

"Who's Jackson?" Daryl murmurs.

"The butcher's son. Rachel's boyfriend."

"Rachel? That Barry's girl?"

"Yep."

"Need a goddamn directory."

Carol chuckles. "You know, that's not a bad idea. Maybe I'll propose that to the Council at the next open town hall. Or if and when I'm on it." She's down to three signatures now, and she's thinking she'll just have Daryl, Sarah, and Emily finish of her petition, despite her earlier goal not to have any Kingdom people sign it.

Daryl drags he a little closer. She curls up, and he molds his body around hers. "Who won?"

"Santiago was breaking it up when I got there. I think Raul would have bashed Jackson's head in if left to fight. He just snapped when Jackson jumped him."

"Shit."

"I know. I mean, I get why. The way that cult leader treated him, but..." She sighs. "I don't know how well he's going to adjust. Santiago said he starts seeing that psychologist tomorrow."

"But the other guy started it, right?" Daryl asks.

"Yes. When Raul was dancing with Rachel."

"So's just self-defense on Raul's part."

"But even self-defense can result in manslaughter if a man's not careful," Carol replies. "On the plus side, Rachel broke up with Jackson. She doesn't need a jealous, possessive, violent boyfriend."

"Mhmmm...might be why Barry said he's always cleaning his guns when his girl's boy comes to get 'er for a date."

"Don't do that when Sweetheart has a boyfriend," Carol warns him.

"Sweetheart ain't datin'. 'S gonna be a nun."

Carol chuckles. She traces a finger over his lower arm.

"What happened to Raul?"

"Jackson and Raul are both going to be tried and likely fined for public brawling, but neither wanted to press assault charges against the other, so a fine's the worst that will happen. But I did put Jackson in a cell to cool down for the night. Santiago promised to keep Raul at home for the rest of the night." She sighs. "I guess covering for that theft didn't do him any good."

"Did 'em some good. He'd have two marks 'gainst 'em otherwise. And they ain't gonna kick out a deputy's son, less he does some real bad shit."

"I guess not. But Santiago's afraid of losing him after just finding him. If Raul does ever get himself kicked out...I'm guessing Santiago will follow."

"Anything else exctin'?" Daryl asks.

"Gunther took Madam Linda on a hot date."

"Gunther's the one ya want over for dinner? Who's gonna run for council? The assistant farm manager?"

"Yes," she replies. "I suppose we should include professions in the directory. Name, profession, family relationships, and where they lodge - museum, ships, Indian Village, or settlement. "

"Pfft."

"I'm serious. I want to make a directory now."

"Ain't he a lot younger 'n 'er?"

"Fifteen years," Carol says. "But I think they could both use some companionship, at least." She cranes her neck back to shoot him an accusing look, but can see only the glow of his blue eyes. "And what's wrong with a man dating an older woman, anyway? You settled for me."

When she turns back again, he _pfffft_ s. "Ya ain't much older. 'N yer hell of a lot prettier 'n Madam Linda. Gonna be a hell of a lot prettier 'n she is now in thirteen years, too."

"I'll be her age in ten years."

"Whatever."

" _You'll_ be her age in thirteen years."

He's quiet for a moment and says, "Shit. 'M gonna be sixty-five when Sweetheart's a teenager."

"And you'll have the stamina of your average fifty-year-old. You'll be fine. And then later she can take care of you in your dotage."

"Pffft. Ain't dotin' 'round. 'M gonna go out with a blaze of glory 'fore I dote."

"Please don't," Carol says. "I'd like to dote with you."

Daryl kisses her cheek. "Hey," he whispers, "Campin' tomorrow. Ain't gonna be able to fool around with the kid in the tent."

Carol chuckles. "Yeah? So?"

"So...better get it out our systems tonight, huh?"

Carol smiles. She turns in his arms and kisses him. "I guess we better."


	93. Chapter 93

The walker claws with bony fingers against the gray stone sides of the bear pit. "Shit," Daryl mutters. He lazily shoots his crossbow, and a bolt slushes into the creature's eye, which is glassy in its hollow, rotten socket. The monster's legs buckle, and it falls to the ground like a discarded coat.

"Well," Mitch reasons, "at least we didn't catch a bear, too, or it would have been half eaten by now."

"'S drag it out and re-cover the pit."

The gray, peeling mess of a walker's body reveals few secrets, but if it's less than one year turned, Daryl can usually guess how old it is, give or take a month or two. After that, he can tell if it's ancient – meaning five or more years old. But trying to guess anything in between is like throwing darts with a blindfold. This one's ancient, which means the clothes are so torn from its roving in the woods that it's practically naked, and, with only three teeth in its skull, it would have had a hard time making a meal of them.

"Wonder if these things ever just die," Mitch says when they're done dragging it some distance from the pit. "Eventually."

"Don't think so. Think they just…slow down."

"If they _do_ die, just think, your daughter, when she steps out of the gates for the first time, she could maybe go miles and miles and not find a living one."

 _Your daughter_. The matter-of-fact way Mitch says that sends a mixed jolt of pride and fear through Daryl's heart. "How long ya think 'm gonna keep 'er locked behind the gates?"

"Well, at least until she's thirteen."

"Why?" Daryl asks.

"Because that's when you're allowed to start apprenticing."

"Pfft. Went huntin' when I was ten."

"I didn't say she wouldn't be learning to shoot before then. All the kids learn to shoot in school. And those that think they might want to be hunters, they can practice hunting inside the gates before then – in the groves and over the water. You know, squirrels. Birds."

"Ain't no law is there?" Daryl asks. "'Ginst takin' yer kid out?" If they end up going on trade trips to Oceanside, he'll want Aaron and Michonne and the others to meet his daughter.

"No, no l _aw_ , exactly…just, why risk it?"

"'Cause if ya wait too long, they ain't gonna be fit for this world. My daughter ain't gonna be soft."

Mitch seems irritated by that response, though Daryl doesn't know why. He takes out his hand axe from his pack and begins chopping off a branch to cover the pit. "You can't always mold them the way you want them, you know."

Daryl joins him, and they begin laying branches over the empty pit. "Hell ya mean by that?"

"I mean, maybe she won't =be the way you think she's going to be. Maybe she won't even want to hunt."

"Pfft." Daryl goes over to a tree and chops off another thin branch. "Hell wouldn't she want to hunt for?"

"Most of the kids will end up farming or fishing." Mitch takes the end of the branch when it snaps off and drags it toward the pit. "It's just more practical. It feeds more people. And who knows, maybe she'll want to be a doctor or a teacher. Maybe she'll be more delicate than you think."

"Got Carol for a mama. Ain't gonna be _delicate_."

"I just mean…" Mitch positions the branch over the pit. "She'll be who she's going to be. My dad…he wanted me to be tough as nails, and I never was."

"Yer tough."

"Not like him. He was a football player. He was even in the NFL for a few years, before I was born. Linebacker. Me, I didn't like getting tackled. He couldn't understand it, why I didn't want to play."

"Well, 'cause yer a scrawny fucker," Daryl tells him.

"Thanks. But it was more that I didn't want to play any sport. And watching them bored me. if I'd played basketball, at least, that would have been all right…but all I ever wanted to do was draw."

"Draw?" Daryl asks as they continue to cover the pit.

"Draw. I wanted to move to move to California. Make movies. Be an animator. He just didn't get me, and so he didn't have much to do with me. Except hunting. I didn't mind hunting. So I went with him whenever he asked. It was the only way I could spend time with him. The only way I didn't hate spending time with him. Hunting was okay. But he never considered it a _sport_."

"'Cause it ain't. Sports're pointless. Huntin's for survival."

"He'd have fought you if he heard you say that about sports."

"Yeah, well, he'd of lost."

Mitch chuckles. "Probably." They drag a final branch over the pit. "Want to see if we can track a bear since we couldn't trap it?"

"Nah. Gotta head back to take Gary camping."

"Oh, yeah. The big camping trip. Camping for fun. Did you ever think you'd do that again?"

" _Never_ done it," Daryl replies.

"Really? Not even when you were a kid? With your dad?"

"Wasn't _fun_. Was just somethin' I had to do."

Mitch begins walking with him back toward Jamestown. They already snagged a fox in a ground trap they set, so they won't return entirely empty handed. "My dad and I used to camp, when we'd go hunting. I finally came out to him on one of those trips, when I was sixteen. I thought he'd lose his shit, but I just felt like I had to say it."

"'N did he?" asks Daryl, his jaw set tight, because he remembers all the times his father lost his shit on him, and Will Dixon wasn't even a linebacker.

Mitch shakes his head. "No. He just said, 'I've known for three years. Now quit the jibber jabber and load up your damn rifle.' We never talked about it again. Not that we ever talked about much. Was your old man a talker?"

"Only when he wanted to tell me what a useless piece of shit I was."

"Oh." Mitch glances at Daryl with a hint of concern. "Sorry. At least my dad never _told_ me that. He just made me feel that way sometimes. Without the words. His disappointment in me rolled off him like a wave."

"Well, my daddy's words didn't hurt me nearly as much as his whip."

"Jesus," Mitch mutters. "Sorry."

"Don't matter now." At least, Daryl hopes it doesn't matter. He hopes it isn't in him, somewhere, deep down, that potential to tear down his children. He knows he'd never hit his child – he knows that – but he might say something he shouldn't. He might say something he shouldn't more than once. And maybe that's why he wants to believe the blows hurt more than the words, because he knows that if he fails as a father, it won't be through violence. It will be through saying the wrong words, or even more likely, through failing to say the right ones. "Ain't gonna be like him."

"No," Mitch agrees. "You aren't." He lightly changes the subject, his tone turning to teasing. "You know, you're going to have to go to church with Carol when she starts taking the kid."

Daryl slows his pace and peers at Mitch. "Carol don't care if I go."

"Not now, maybe. She will when she's taking the girl."

Daryl hadn't thought about that. Is having a daughter going to change Carol's expectations of him? Is she not going to want him roaming outside the gates as often as he does? Sleeping in on Sundays, dropping f-bombs, leaving his arrows lying around. Well, he's learned not to do that one. He already got in trouble with Shannon for doing that. But he wonders what else he's going to be expected to do or not to do.

Beside him, Mitch chuckles.

[*]

Gary, who rests on his knees in the center of the rowboat, points across the blue-black ripples on the surface of the water to another rowboat that appears empty. "That boat's wockin'!"

Daryl pulls on the oars as Carol shares a secret smile with him over the head of the preschooler. The smile reminds her of the smiles they used to share in the prison, when they were first forging a deep friendship and she was exploring her ability to flirt again, free from Ed's looming observation.

"Why's boat wockin'?" Gary demands to know.

It's rocking because there are two people lying down flat in it and going at it. That's what happens sometimes when people live in barracks or shared rooms or huts. On patrol, Carol once came across a couple on the pews of the chapel and had to tell them to find a more appropriate venue for their festivities. Everyone's a teenager when there's a housing shortage, it seems.

"Ghosts," Daryl tells him.

"Ghosts!" Gary repeats in horror, his light brown eyes widening.

"Daryl!" Carol scolds. "Don't tell him that. There are no ghosts, Gary."

"Kid can't be afraid of ghosts," Daryl mutters. "When we got walkers."

"He's never seen a walker."

"Yeah, well Garland needs to show 'em one then. Show 'em how to kill one."

"I don't disagree," Carol says. "But there are no ghosts on the boat, Gary. No ghosts."

"No ghosts?" Gary repeats, turning his little face from the rocking boat to hers.

"No ghosts," she promises him. "Just people in there."

"People wockin'?"

She smiles. "Yes, people rocking."

"Mommy and Daddy wock."

Daryl splutter laughs.

Gary throws his hand out in a stop sign gesture. "Gawy get out!"

"Is that what they said when ya walked in 'n caught 'em rockin'?" Daryl asks.

Gary nods.

Carol smiles across the boat at Daryl again, and he catches her smile with a reflection of his own.

When they get to shore, Daryl drags the rowboat up onto the rocky island that houses the lighthouse. He's already deposited all the gear in a pile beyond the rocks, in his first trip over, before returning to fetch Carol and the boy from the docks.

The island is clear of walkers, but there are still some animals on it. Birds fly among the trees, and a turtle is now crawling off a rock toward the river as Gary tries to stop it.

"Gentle!" Daryl warns him as he plucks it up by its shell.

"Tuwtle!"

"Yeah."

"My tuwtle!"

"Put in a box," Daryl assures him as he takes it gently from the preschooler's hand before the boy can drop it on the rocks. "Bring it home for a pet."

"Do you have a box?" Carol asks.

"Make a pen. Get a box when we get back." The turtle in one hand, Daryl picks up his pack with the other and slings it on his shoulder. Gary imitates him, slinging his backpack on the same shoulder, even though, unlike Daryl, the boy is lefthanded.

"I guess I'm carrying the tent?" Carol says.

"Pfft." Daryl hands over the turtle and picks up the rest of the camping gear. "Seen a good spot a half mile in. Not rocky. Smooth."

Carol puts a hand on Gary's back and guides him toward the interior of the little island. The spot turns out to be not far from the lighthouse, on a flat bit of land just outside a grove of trees.

Carol waves up to Sarah, who is on duty in the lighthouse, which is used as an around-the-clock watchtower now. It's rarely used to guide the ships, since they don't venture out at night. But the _Susan Constant_ is on the river now, in the far distance, with Captain David Cummins at its helm, and even this far away the shouts of the men as they yell commands to one other to drop and raise the nets can be heard.

This island will probably be as safe as anything inside the gates of Jamestown, since walkers can't swim and any other land is a long ways off. No one's ever come at Jamestown from that direction, but Jamestown is ready if they do.

Gary helps Daryl build a pin for his turtle – which means bringing him the sticks and stones he asks for – while Carol unpacks the tent. Together they put up the tent, with Gary's "help," but the boy is more interested in chasing dragon flies than following directions.

Carol and Daryl take the boy for a short hike, hoping to get his energy out before dinner. They get a lot of "Pwetty wock!" along the way as Gary digs out rocks from the ground, shows them to them, and buries them in his pockets for his rock collection.

"All look the same," Daryl mutters to Carol under his breath, and she pats his arm indulgently.

Gary's remarkably difficult to keep up with, given that he has such short little legs. "No wonder Shannon's exhausted!" Carol murmurs to Daryl.

Gary does settle down long enough, though, for Daryl to show him how to light a fire with two sticks when its nearing dinner time.

The boy tries to imitate him, but he can't make the sticks catch.

"'S okay. Y'll learn."

"Daddy uses…" Gary makes a gesture as if striking a match against a box. "Fi-wer things."

"Matches, yeah," Daryl says. "But ya ain't always gonna have matches. Gotta learn this way. Your daddy did it this way when he was alone out there all those months."

"Daddy not alone!"

"Well, no, not now," Daryl tells him. "But he was."

Gary seems to consider this, but what he asks is a completely different question. "Why daddy not bwon?"

Daryl glances at Carol, who has just drawn out the plastic bag of home-made marshmallows they purchased for tobacco while looking for the cooking pan.

"Daddy not bwon! Mommy not bwon! Vandy not bwon! Me!" Gary points to the skin on his arm. "Gawy bwon."

"That's really a question for you to ask your parents, sweetie," Carol tells him. "But families come in all different colors."

Gary rolls his eyes, like he's already heard that explanation a hundred times and found it wanting. But then he sees the marshmallows, and his eyes grow wide, and he starts bouncing in place.

" _After_ dinner," Carol tells him.

"Hell no!" Daryl insists. "'S a campin' trip. Dessert first. Right, Gare?"

"Wight!"

Daryl snaps a twig, snakes a marshmallow from the bag, spears it, and hands the stick to Gary. "Hold it careful over the fire. Don't set it – "

Too late. The marshmallow is ablaze. Daryl snatches the stuck out of the fire and blows it out.

Gary frowns. "I did bad?"

"Nah. 'S how they're best," Daryl reassures him. "Good 'n black 'n gooey inside." Daryl makes a nom-nom-nom noise and pretends to eat the marshmallow, as a giggling Gary fights for the stick.


	94. Chapter 94

After marshmallows are roasted, Gary demands singing.

"Yeah, ain't doin' that," Daryl insists, but Carol plays along while Daryl "secures the perimeter." There's not much to secure. There's no need to put up jangling cans around the campsite, as there are no walkers or large animals on the island, but Daryl finds a way to busy himself with the task anyway. While he's roaming the outside of their camp, however, he does manage to shoot a snake with his crossbow.

He settles back down next to Carol before the fire as Gary's out-of-key singing tapers off. "Ya got a pretty voice," he tells her.

"No. I just have a regular mom voice."

"Yeah, well, yer regular mom voice is pretty." He holds up the snake in the boy's direction. "Look at this, Gare. Gonna show ya how to skin one."

Gary watches eagerly at first, but is soon saying, "Ewwwwww! Wucky snake!"

"It'll taste good when we roast it," Daryl assures him.

"Hot dogs!" Gary exclaims, because in all the picture books he reads with his father, camping means marshmallows, camp songs, and hot dogs.

"Ain't got no hot dogs."

Carol leans toward Daryl and says, in a low voice, "I did pack some s-a-u-s-a-g-e-s."

"Saw sages?" Daryl asks, and then, "Oh."

Carol laughs.

"Sausages'll keep for breakfast. 'S eat the snake for dinner."

Gary narrows his eyes.

"You've had it in soup before, kid," Daryl assures him. He stabs a bit of meat onto a stick and hands it over. Gary sticks it straight in the flame, and the stick catches fire and has to be blown out.

"Best way!" Gary insists.

Daryl chuckles and gets him a new stick. "Hold it _above_ the flame. And 's gonna take awhile."

Because the boy is young, and he's been running around the island all evening, he conks out by eight o'clock. So does Daryl, lying on his back on the floor of the tent with Gary rolled up against his side between him and Carol. It's always made Carol jealous, the way Daryl can fall asleep so easily, in any environment, under any circumstances. But he wakes up just as easily at the first sign of threat, as he does now, when boots crunch on the pebbly earth outside the tent. He opens a single eye and stares at the shadow looming against the green fabric of the tent – a pair of thick combat boots beneath canvas work pants, a figure rising and then disappearing at the shoulders.

Carol seizes her knife from the knapsack in the corner of the tent and holds her breath, but her grasp relaxes when crunching bootsteps in the other direction are followed by Sarah's voice, "You're early. You aren't supposed to relive me for an hour and a half."

"I thought you might want to spend Saturday night with your boyfriend the captain." The other voice is Santiago's.

Daryl closes his eye. He shifts his arm around the boy and instantly falls back to sleep. How does he do that? Carol is wide awake. Nevertheless, she closes her eyes as the murmur of conversation outside pierces the tent.

"What's with the tent?" Santiago asks. "Someone get exiled for an evening? Is that a new sentence the jury's trying out?"

"Carol and Daryl and the mayor's boy are in there. They're taking him camping."

Santiago snickers. "Camping?"

"Why are you here?" Sarah asks. "Do you need the hours? Because I haven't finished my twenty this week."

"You can have the time. I'll work it, but you can have it."

" _Giving_ me an hour and a half, are you?"

"Don't sound so suspicious. Can't a friend help out a friend?"

"How's Raul healing up?" Sarah asks.

"Fine," Santiago replies. "He did worse to the other kid. I'm just sorry you and I never got that dance."

"You need to keep him out of trouble. He's got a record now."

Santiago sighs. "You're not telling me anything I don't already know. If worst comes to worse, and Raul's kicked out, well…I'll go with him."

"You don't have to do that."

"He's my son. I wasn't there for him while he was becoming a man…hell, I wasn't there for him half the time when he was in middle school. I was in another state. I have to be there for him now."

"Well, I'll keep an eye on him for you," Sarah says.

"That's kind of you. So are you headed off to the captain's cabin on board ship?"

"He's not expecting me. I'll probably get a drink at the tavern and then head to bed in the museum."

"You should stop by the captain's cabin," Santiago insists. "No need to announce yourself. I mean, you two are _serious_ now aren't you?"

"Why the push?"

"Forgive me for trying to give you a little time on a Saturday night with your boyfriend."

For a moment, there's only the sound of toads croaking and the buzz of insects.

"I don't know what to make of you sometimes, Santiago."

"You don't have to make anything of me at all. Just enjoy your evening with your amour."

Carol opens her eyes long enough to see the shadow of a pair of binoculars being exchanged. Boots crunch over the earth as Sarah heads to the shore to row back to the dock and Santiago walks on to the light house.

[*]

In the morning they roast sausages over a newly lit fire for breakfast. Santiago joins them for a moment, as his replacement, Deputy Andrew, rows across the river toward the island. "It's an excellent view from that light house," he says. "You can see half of Jamestown. I don't know why we didn't think to have a man in there before the mutiny."

"Necessity is the mother of invention," Carol tells him. "Sausage?"

"Don't mind if I do." Santiago hisses when he grabs it, sets it on his knee, and licks his burnt fingertips.

"I meant for you to take the entire stick," Carol tells him.

Santiago does take the stick and spears the sausage on his pants leg. He blows on it and takes a small bite. "I used to take Raul camping along the Rio Grande," he says. "I guess he learned to be alert early. You never knew when a group would be crossing and trampling through your camp site. I suppose our immigration problem hasn't gotten any less complicated. But now my son is the immigrant."

"Nearly all of us are," Carol replies. "How many original inhabitants still live here? People who were here when the camp started?"

"Maybe fifty," Santiago answers. "But I've been here six years. That's like being a fourth generation Texan in this world. I sure would hate to leave it. I hope Raul keeps his nose clean."

"That fight wasn't his fault," Carol tells him. "Though he _did_ elevate it."

"I thought he might have killed the boy if I hadn't stopped it," Santiago admits. "He was alone too long. Over a year and half after Williamsburg fell, and then the abuse he suffered at the hands of that cult…I don't know if he's capable of not seeing threats and potential starvation around every corner."

"'Cause there _is_ threat 'n starvation 'round every corner," Daryl replies. He hands Gary his canteen. The little boy takes a gulp, and some water dribbles out around the edges and down his chin.

"You think so?" Santiago asks.

"Lost more camps 'n I can count," Daryl says.

"We even lost the Kingdom," Carol says quietly, though she misses it less and less with each passing day. She, feels like Jamestown is becoming home, might already _be_ home.

"Yet you don't jump at every shadow," Santiago observes, "and you don't lose control."

"We all done things we wish we hadn't," Daryl mutters. "Ain't you?"

"Not since I found Jamestown. Well, except trying to bed Sarah on the first date. I wish I hadn't done _that_."

"Bed?" Gary asks, and the adults suddenly remember that even if his speech is not yet advanced enough to form paragraphs, he's a keen listener.

"Well I should be going. My relief is here." Santiago stands as Deputy Andrew drags the rowboat up on shore several yards away. "Enjoy the rest of your camping extravaganza."

They do. They keep an eye on Gary as he chases toads, and they explore the island a bit before rowing out to fish in the river. They find a way to kill time to give Shannon and Garland more, and when they get back to the cabin around one in the afternoon, ready for a late lunch, Garland is just heading out to the office to work. He kisses Shannon goodbye, gives Gary a big hug, and thanks Daryl and Carol for occupying him.

Sweetheart, who is sitting on the rug and patting Dog – perhaps a little too roughly, though the canine tolerates it – looks up and squeals when she sees Carol and Daryl. Carol smiles to be recognized and goes over and scoops her up for a hug and a kiss. "Were you good for your Aunt Shannon?" she asks.

"She slept through the whole night again," Shannon answers. "And only pulled Dog's tail three times."

Dog whines at the mention of his name.

After lunch, Daryl kisses Sweetheart goodbye and goes to work on the cabin for the rest of his day off. One of the teenage orphans comes over to babysit for an hour while Carol and Shannon work in the community gardens. "Do you have to pay her?" Carol asks.

"Not much," Shannon says. "She does it for a little extra sugar. And Gary loves her. She works at the preschool for her twenty hours." All the kids have to work their own twenty once they turn thirteen. Most do it through apprenticeships. "Although, you know, when y'all have your own cabin, we should set up a babysitting swap."

"Sounds like a good plan to me. How did your time to yourselves go?" Carol asks as she plucks up some pesky weeds.

"The babies were surprisingly cooperative. Like I said, Sweetheart slept through the night, and VanDaryl only woke _once_ , halfway through, believe it or not. Garland was so sweet. He made me dinner. Of course, it was pretty awful. The man has a lot of virtues, but cooking isn't one of them."

Carol laughs.

"But it was sweet of him to try. And he got me another record from somewhere. I suppose he traded for it. He put it on and we danced." Shannon uses some wire to support a vine. "And then I made the mistake of telling him how nice it was, because we never had a courtship before we got married."

"Why was that a mistake?" Carol pushes some fertilizer into the soil.

"Because then it all came pouring out – how I only married him because I had to, because I needed to survive. And if I came through those gates today, and had my pick of all the men in Jamestown, I probably wouldn't marry him."

"And did you set him straight?"

"I think so. I mean who the hell does he think I _would_ marry?"

Carol chuckles. "Did you ask him that?"

"Of course I asked him that, and he said maybe Dante. I pointed out Dante's been in love with Inola for God knows how long. He says maybe Captain Cummins, I pointed out Captain Cummins has a girlfriend, and, besides, he's possibly a little light in the loafers."

"Oh, you think so, too?"

"Honey, they're never _that_ good-looking and _that_ well-kept unless they are. Anyway, Garland tries to think real hard who might be competition for him and realizes there's pretty much no one. So then he concludes – well you might settle for me just because there's no one better. And then I just burst out laughing and said, you're damn right, baby, there's no one better."

Carol smiles as she reaches for a small hand shovel.

"I think those breakups in the old world really did a number on his self-esteem," Shannon continiues. " _Two_ fiances dumped him over all the working. So we talked about that, too, and he's aware it's a problem, his workaholic nature, and he's doing his best to curb it a little. Y'all have been a great help with that, but it's not just needing the hours for me and the kids. He likes it. The working. Doing keeps him from worrying. He said one more year as mayor and then he's stepping down. He won't run again. But he really feels Jamestown needs him one more year, and I agree."

"I'm glad you got some things worked out."

"And we had fantastic sex, too, of course."

"I thought you said you were too tired for _energetic_ sex?" Carol teases.

"Yeah, well, after he romanced me like that, I suppose I found some energy." Shannon digs her handrake in the ground and pauses with a hand on the handle. "You know what's so strange about his insecurity?"

"What's that?"

"It never occurred to him _I_ might be the one who should be insecure. You know, he married me when there was literally no other single woman in town. Well, other than old women and teenage girls. And Tanya, she came from my old camp, she was pregnant, too, but, she's kind of homely, if I'm being honest. And she still got snatched up in no time. And I've put two babies through this body in the past three years. He's the mayor. He's the former sheriff. He's the expert marksman and solver of cases. He has the respect of most of the town. And now we do have a few more single women. If he was looking too, he could probably have any single woman he wanted, and a few married ones, too. But he's stuck with me because he snatched me up when I was all there was, and he's a moral man. He'd never cheat on his wife or abandon her."

"And did you tell him all this?"

Shannon sighs. "It was really hard to. I felt like if I said it out loud he'd realize it was true. I thought – for some reason he's not aware how many women he could have, but if I say it, he'll be aware."

"He's not _aware_ because he's head-over-heels in love with you," Carol tells her. "So he doesn't _care_ how many other women he could have."

"As it turns out…he _is_ aware."

"Oh?"

"Apparently he's been hit on more than once, by more than one woman."

" _Oh._ " Carol wonders, suddenly, if Daryl's similarly aware. He didn't seem to notice those women _ooing_ over his arms as they watched him work, but maybe someone's come onto him and he just hasn't mentioned it.

"But you're right about the doesn't care part. He loves me, and he's not interested in anyone else, and I suppose I knew that full well, but I guess I needed to _hear_ it. But of course I demanded to know who these women were."

"Of course," Carol agrees.

"But he refused to tell me because he thought I'd make a scene marking my territory."

Shannon probably _would_ make a scene, Carol thinks.

"So now every time a woman speaks to him, I'm going to think – was it _her_?"

Carol holds up a hand. "It wasn't me. I swear."

Shannon laughs. She seems to be contemplating for a moment, and then she says, "Who do you think would win in a fight? Garland or Daryl?"

"Daryl," Carol says instantly.

"Yeah, you're probably right. Unless it was a gunfight."

[*]

Daryl is struggling to lay logs by himself, using ropes and a pully and situating one end at a time, when Santiago's kid appears on the scene, seizes the other end of the slipping log, and situates it.

"Thanks."

"Sure. Uh…my dad tells me you pay people to help you sometimes?"

"Yeah. Ya wanna work for me?"

"My dad wants me to. Says you'll pay me tobacco or ammo, and I can trade it for food, and then if I have more storage food…I'll feel…safer."

"'N ya won't have to steal it?"

Raul's light brown skin flushes an orange-red. He looks around to make sure no one is in earshot. "Carol told you about that?" he whispers.

"She's m'wife."

"Did she tell anyone else?"

"Nah. But she ain't gonna give ya 'nother free pass."

Raul swallows and nods. "I know."

"Untie the rope 'n bring it over to this one," Daryl says as he walks toward the pile of logs.

While they're working, Barry's daughter Rachel stops by to say hello, and Raul turns that red-orange color again. They talk for a bit, and Rachel keeps looking over her shoulder at her boyfriend Jackson, who is sitting with another teenager on a wooden bench playing cards. The nineteen-year-old has stopped to glower in her direction, and his opponent nudges him to play a card. Rachel returns her attention to Raul and puts a hand on his arm. Raul doesn't flinch from her the way he does when men touch him. He seems more excitedly nervous than fearfully nervous at her touch. She says something about her apprenticeship in the gardens, and Raul manages a semi-coherent reply.

"We gotta get back to work now," Daryl tells her, and Rachel lets her hand slip away and waves goodbye to Raul, who nods shyly.

As they return to the logs to tie the rope around another, Daryl says, "Word to the wise, kid?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't be led by yer dick."

"What?"

"That girl's trouble."

"Rachel?" Raul asks. "Why?"

"See how she kept lookin' back at 'er boyfriend?"

" _Ex_ -boyfriend," Raul corrects him. "They broke up."

"Mhmhm. For now. 'Cause she's tryin' to make 'em jealous with you. Knew plenty of girls like that in m' old neighborhood. They get off on guys fightin' over 'em."

"Nah," Raul says and looks back at the retreating Rachel, but frowns when he finds her talking to Jackson.

"Ain't worth it," Daryl mutters. "Ya got keep yer head low 'n yer nose clean for two months. Don't go chasin' tail 'til yer a citizen."

Raul throws one last glance over his shoulder at Rachel and then gets back to work.


	95. Chapter 95

On Monday evening, while a babysitter watches the kids, Carol and Daryl are called before the Town Council during its regular closed-door session for an adoption interview. The adoption panel wants to know about their previous parenting experience. Carol struggles to remain unemotional while mentioning Sophia. "I had a little girl. She was twelve when I lost her to cannibals in the first year of the New Era." She's learned to use the terminology of Jamestown.

"And how did it happen that you lost her to cannibals?" Marcus asks, and Carol's fingers curl around the edge of her plastic chair.

Daryl's eyes caress her with concern, and when her throat bobs, he answers for her. "Got split by a herd on the highway, n' the girl went over the guardrail to 'scape 'em. Lost 'er 'n when we'd found 'er, she was turned."

"And did you go after her, Mrs. Dixon?" Barry asks. "When she went over the guardrail?"

"Rick went after her," Carol replies.

Carolyn rests her elbows on the long folding table behind which the Council sits. "Rick was your first husband then?"

"No. My first husband was dead then. Rick was the leader of our group."

The judge and sherrif's wife, Ana, places a hand on her not-yet-showing stomach. "Why didn't you go after her instead of this Rick?"

"I…" Carol's knuckles whiten as she grips the chair more tightly. Shannon shoots her a sympathetic look from the Council table, and Garland shifts uncomfortably in his chair.

"She couldn't," Daryl interrupts. "Was under a car."

"And Rick was where?" the farm manager, Ernesto, asks.

Carol swallows. "He was under a car, too."

"He was closest to her," Daryl hastens. "So he went after 'er."

Carol didn't expect Rick to leave her daughter alone in the hollow of a tree. Rick had his reasons, she knows, but she can't help but wonder if Daryl had been with Sophia instead, if he would have done things differently, carried her on his back as they fled the walkers, or found a way to kill them, and not have left a helpless child _alone_. She wonders, sometimes, if only _Daryl_ had been there instead…

But who is she to judge? As the Council has just pointed out, she, Sophia's _own mother_ , was cowering beneath a car when the little girl went over that rail. Carol didn't pursue Sophia down that ravine and into the woods. She wasn't the one to leap the guardrail and try to save her. That was Rick, and Rick alone.

"And where were you during all this, Daryl?" Captain Cummins asks.

Daryl's nostrils flare slightly. "Farther away. Didn't know it happened 'til they told me."

"Daryl searched for Sophia for days," Carol says quietly. "He tracked her, and he was badly injured looking for her. He did everything he could to find her. But it was already too late."

"Did you – " Dr. Ahmad begins, but is interrupted by Garland, who says, "- That's enough questions on that subject. Let's not poke old wounds. You have an adopted son, also, Mrs. Dixon?"

"Yes," she answers. "Henry. He's in Oceanside."

"Why isn't he here with you?" Ana asks. "In Jamestown?"

"He moved to Oceanside to be near his girlfriend, who is now his fiancé. He's happily settled there."

"And you raised him from what age to what age?" Barry asks.

"He was eleven when I adopted him. He was almost sixteen when he moved to Oceanside."

"So you raised him for five years," Dr. Ahmad says.

"Yes." The five years she was apart from Daryl, ruling the Kingdom first with Ezekiel and then alone.

"Into an independent young man, apparently," Shannon adds.

"And Daryl raised him, too?" Ernesto asks.

"Nah," Daryl answers. "Was in diff'rn camp then."

"When did you two marry?" Ernesto wants to know.

"Little over a year ago," Daryl answers.

"Ah," the farm manager replies. He glances at the adoption papers that have been left in the center of the table. "And you've never had children, Mr. Dixon?"

"No."

"Daryl's been an uncle or godfather to several children," Carol expands his woeful simplistic answer. "Rick's daughter Judith, a little boy name Hershel – "

"- He's VanDaryl's godfather," Shannon interrupts. "Gary's, too, really. He just took Gary camping this weekend. My little boy had a _blast_."

"But you've never been a father yourself?" Ernesto asks.

"No."

Carol glances at Daryl to find him gritting his teeth, the way he does when he's pressing down some unpleasant emotion.

Carolyn address Daryl. "What's your view on corporal punishment?"

"M'view?"

"How will you discipline your child?"

"Well I ain't gonna beat 'er if that's what yer askin'!" he barks.

Much of the Council shifts at his angry reaction, and Carol closes her eyes for a moment before opening them. Daryl looks at her apologetically.

"I was merely asking what type of discipline you plan to use," Carolyn says calmly.

Daryl glances at Carol. It's clearly not something he's considered, but Carol's pretty sure if someone's going to be the disciplinarian in this scenario, it's going to be _her_ , not him. That little girl is going to have him wrapped around her tiny finger, like Judith did, only worse. But Carol's been stern with children when she _needs_ to be. Maybe _too_ stern, sometimes, she thinks now. She wanted so much to make those prison children ready for the world. The world is a harsh place, and not just now. It always has been. But maybe kids don't need to be often reminded of that. Maybe, even in this world, they just need a chance to be _kids_.

"Redirection when she's little," Carol answers. "Sometimes we'll just allow for natural consequences." Daryl gives her a funny look. "Taking away privileges, if and when necessary. Possibly assigning extra chores. When she's older, we hope to reason with her and -"

Barry snorts. "Sorry," he apologizes. "It's just…I have a teenage girl myself."

One who picks terrible boyfriends, too, Carol thinks, though Rachel did break up with Jackson. But Carol saw the teenager flirting with her ex-boyfriend earlier today, _and_ flirting with Raul. "Well, we'll _try_ ," Carol says. "I raised a teenage boy. I know how headstrong teenagers can be. I know sometimes you can't reason with them, and you have to give them their space to make mistakes."

"Is that why you let yours leave home at only fifteen?" Carolyn asks.

"Yes," Carol replies coolly.

"Fifteen is a man in this world," Ernesto replies dismissively. "Or _ought_ to be."

"He had people to look out for him in Oceanside," Carol clarifies. "The community has always raised the children there. I knew I could give him the space he needed while still trusting he'd get reasonable guidance."

"But you're aware," Dr. Ahmad says, "that you are required to provide housing for any child you adopt until at least the age of eighteen."

"Yes, of course," Carol says. "And that won't be a problem. Daryl's building us a cabin."

"A one-room cabin?" Carolyn asks.

"We'll put up room dividers with curtains, and she'll have her own space," Carol insists.

"Earl and I only have a one-room cabin," Ana says. "And we're having a baby. This isn't exactly the suburbs, Carolyn. We have families of four living in some one-room huts."

"I'm aware," Carolyn replies coolly. "I was just inquiring about the cabin."

The Council asks a few more questions and then dismisses the couple to deliberate, telling Daryl and Carol to wait in the theater and that they'll send someone to retrieve them when the decision has been made.

The theater is empty when Carol flicks on just one row of overhead lights toward the back. A chair creaks as she settles into it by the aisle. Daryl sits on the wooden arm of a theater chair across the aisle from her, his legs stretched out on the frayed blue industrial carpet, and chews on his thumbnail. "Think I fucked it up?" he murmurs around the nail.

"No. Of course not."

He lowers his thumb from his mouth and picks at the nail instead. "Shouldn't of gotten mad. She don't know my history. Didn't mean nothin' by the question. Just felt…"

"Judged."

"Yeah."

Carol nods. "Me, too. But I guess we _are_ being judged. I mean, that's the point of having a review. But Garland said it was just going to be a formality."

"Ya don't sound so sure."

"I'm sure that's what he _said_. I'm not so sure now that's what it _was_." She drums her fingers on the arm of her chair. Then she smirks and peers at him. "Wanna make out in the back of the theater to distract ourselves while we wait?"

"Pfft. Stop."

"You haven't taken me to a movie yet, you know."

"Cause they show shit movies. All kids' movies and romance crap."

"You're going to be taking Sweetheart to a lot of kids' movies, you know."

"Yeah," he says quietly, looking down at one thumbnail digging beneath the other. "Hope so."

"Who else are they going to give her to?"

"Dunno. Maybe they figured out I don't know shit 'bout bein' a decent daddy."

"You know plenty about being a decent daddy. It comes naturally to you."

"No. It don't. Gettin' pissed off comes naturally to me. Gotta…push it down. Had to push it down a dozen times on that campin' trip. Like when Gary lit that damn stick on fire _right_ after I told 'em _not_ to. Or when he kicked me in the nuts in his sleep."

"Well then you did an amazing job of pushing it down." Carol smile-pouts at him. "Pookie, _everyone_ gets annoyed with children sometimes. Because children can be annoying. We _all_ have to push it down."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Hell's _redirection_?" he asks.

Carol chuckles. "You're not hip to the parenting terminology, are you?"

"I ain't hip to shit."

"It means when they're doing something they aren't supposed to be doing, you guide their attention to something else that's better for them to be doing. Like…if she's playing with a light socket, you guide her over to the blocks and say, play with these instead."

"We ain't gonna have no light sockets."

"That's not the point. The point is you can't reason with them when they're little, so you just guide them away from the thing they aren't supposed to be doing to a better thing to do."

"How's that _discipline_?"

"Because it teaches them to make better choices."

Daryl seems to consider this as he plays with the theater seat behind him, pushing it down and letting it spring up. "Thought discipline was when somethin' bad happens to ya 'cause ya did somethin' bad. Or your folks _think_ ya did somethin' bad."

"That's punishment."

"Hmmm. So what the hell's _natural consequences_?"

"That's when she's playing with the light socket and you let her get shocked so she learns not to do it again. I don't recommend that in the case of toddlers and light sockets, but there _are_ times when just letting nature take its course is appropriate."

"Think 'em gonna leave the discipline to ya."

"Oh, no. That's not how this is going to work," Carol assures him. "We're a team. But…we'll have to talk it out and figure it out along the way. Every kid is different, so the discipline has to be different. And we're both going to make mistakes. We'll do things that don't work and have to figure out what does work. We'll both lose our cool sometimes and have to apologize. But…we'll figure it out."

"Can't lose m'cool."

"You will."

" _Can't_ ," he says.

"You've lost it with me, and it wasn't the end of the world."

"Nah. I ain't. I ain't lost it with you."

"In the woods, back on the farm, when you told me all I had to do was watch Sophia. When you got in my face and - "

"- Ya flinched 'cause ya thought I was gonna hit ya."

"Yes."

He swallows. "I was an asshole, yeah. Said things I shouldn't of. 'Cept, thing is…I _was_ keepin' my cool. 'S what ya don't understand 'bout me. That was me keepin' m'cool."

"Okay, then keep your cool. But you are going to say things you regret. All parents do, and it's not the end of the world if you do. You just apologize and explain you're human and try really hard not to do it again."

"Ya know how many times m'daddy apologized to me?"

"Never?"

"Mhmhm."

"You're not your father and you never will be, Daryl."

"I know. But I ain't Ward Cleaver neither."

"Good," says Carol, standing from her chair and kicking his boot so he draws his legs out of the aisle and plants his feet down instead. She closes the distance between them. "Because I never had an urge to fuck Ward Cleaver." She puts a hand on his hip and kisses him. Daryl snakes one arm around her back and puts a hand flat on her ass, opens his legs and pushes her against him while he deepens the kiss. His other hand has just settled on her breast when there's the sound of a throat clearing in the open entryway of the theater.

Daryl pulls back and Carol steps back.

"Sorry to interrupt," Santiago says, "but I was on patrol and was passing the Council Chambers. They asked me to call you in."

"Damn that was quick," Daryl mutters as he stands from his position slouched against the arm of the theater chair. He and Carol exchange a nervous glance as they walk from the theater.

Carol slaps the light switch down on their way out.


	96. Chapter 96

"Have a seat," Mayor Barron tells them when they reenter the Council Chambers. Daryl slides onto the warm, stiff plastic chair next to Carol. The air conditioning must be set at 85, to save on the limited solar power, because it feels sweltering in here, although he didn't remember it feeling quite this hot a few minutes ago. He puts his hands on the lightly torn knees of his canvas pants. Carol reaches over and puts one of her hands over his.

"We won't draw this out," Garland says. "We're pleased to announce your adoption has been approved."

Daryl lets out a long breath he wasn't aware he was holding.

"Once your cabin is built, the Sherriff will do an initial inspection," Garland continues, "and then there will be a home inspection around mid-year, but I'll be formally entering the adoption of Alexandra Sweetheart Dixon into the town records this evening."

"Thank you," Carol says.

"No, thank _you_ ," Captain Cummins tells her, "for being willing to give of yourselves to raise this child."

"Any further comments?" Garland asks.

The council members shake their heads.

"Then this council meeting is officially adjourned."

Chairs scrape back and Daryl feels his face pulling into a big smile.

[*]

That evening, Carol feeds her newly adopted daughter with a bottle of breast milk Shannon expressed in the afternoon. Sweetheart's big eyes look up at her as she pulls on the nipple and makes quiet slurping sounds.

Meanwhile, Shannon feeds her own son. Daryl puts the crossbow he's been fiddling with out of reach of Gary by hanging it on a hook on the back of the front door and comes to look down at his daughter. "Hell's wrong with 'er eyes?"

" _Nothing's wrong_ with her eyes," Carol replies. "What do you mean?"

"They were blue. Now they ain't all the way. Got like a ring of yellow-brown in 'em. 'S jaundice or some shit?"

Carol laughs. "No. They've been settling into their natural color. It takes until nine months sometimes. They're not going to be blue. They'll be hazel. They'll probably always look a little different depending on the light."

"Oh I _love_ hazel eyes," Shannon says. "Captain Cummins has hazel eyes. They're _gorgeous_."

Garland clears his throat as he puts the last dish in the hutch from the late dinner they shared.

"Oh, don't worry, baby, the captain's no challenge for _you_. I think he's a little light in the loafers."

"Captain Cummins?" Garland replies as he shuts the door to the hutch. "I doubt that very much."

"How would you know?" Shannon asks.

"I used to play poker with the man once a month. Before things got so…" he glances at VanDaryl moving beneath the nursing blanket. "Busy."

"You know who else has gorgeous hazel eyes?" Shannon asks Carol. "Gunther." She shoots Garland a teasing look. "Don't worry, Gunther's not my type."

"And why's that?" Garland asks as he comes to sit beside her on the couch.

"Well, for one, he's fifteen years older than me."

"I'm ten years older than you."

"And for another, you know…the _drinking_."

"I don't think I've _ever_ seen Gunther drunk," Carol says with surprise as Sweetheart pulls away from the bottle. Carol raises the baby against her shoulder to burb her. Daryl runs a finger over her fine, light brown hair.

"Oh, honey, you've probably never seen him _completely_ _sober_ ," Shannon says. "When he is, he's as sullen as a sorehead dog." Dog looks up from his spot on the rug, realizes no one is addressing him, and settles his head on his paws. "When he's got a buzz, which he does pretty much five nights a week, he's friendly, but not _overly_ friendly. In other words, he acts like a normal person."

"You're telling me Gunther's been buzzed every time I've talked to him?" Carol asks skeptically.

"He's a _highly_ functional alcoholic," Shannon insists. She slides VanDaryl from under the nursing blanket and rests him against her shoulder to rub his back until he burps. "Reliable and well behaved. But he's going to destroy his liver by the time he's sixty-five. Not to mention the _expense_."

"He grows enough private tobacco to support his drinking habit," Garland says.

"Oh, so you're defending him now?" Shannon asks.

"I like him well enough," Garland replies. "When my wife's not talking about how gorgeous his eyes are."

Shannon chuckles.

"He does his job well," Garland continues, "stays out of trouble, makes useful suggestions to the Council. So he drinks. It's a rough world. Everyone has their crutch to lean on. I'm just damn lucky mine's a good wife."

Shannon smiles. "That's a good one, baby. Keep those coming."

"Could use a drink m'self," Daryl mutters.

"The adoption hearing was a bit stressful," Carol agrees.

"Some of those questions were harsh," Shannon agrees. "I'm sorry you had to go through that."

"I suppose I should be grateful the Council looks out for the orphans," Carol says. "But I could use a drink, too."

"Why don't you two go on out to the tavern once Alexandra is down for the night?" Garland suggests.

"Good idea," Shannon agrees. "She hasn't been waking up, but if she does, we've got her. Go have yourselves a celebratory drink now that the adoption's finalized."

Carol looks up at Daryl, who nods.

"Are you going to call the baby by her formal name now?" Shannon asks her husband.

"Now that I know what it is, why not?" Garland replies.

"Well I'm not. She'll always be Sweetheart to me."

"I don't think she's going to want to be Sweetheart when she's sixteen," Garland suggests. "The boys will have a field day with that. You know _how_ they'll say it to her."

Daryl glowers.

"Not our boys," Shannon insists. "Because you're going to raise them to be absolute gentlemen, aren't you, baby?"

Garland glances at Gary, who is attempting to do headstands on the deerskin rug, but who keeps tumbling over in half rolls. This time he hits dog, who whelps and whines and squeezes out from under the boys' leg. The canine patters over to the rocking chair, where he curls up and sits down at Carol's feet.

Garland sighs. "Well, I'm going to _try_."

[*]

It being a Monday night, and an hour from closing time, the tavern is sparsely populated. The waitress Trisha is leaned with her elbows on one end of the curved bar, kissing Deputy Andrew. Santiago and Gunther sit side by side on the opposite curve of the bar, chatting with Candy, who is drying glasses. Inola and Dante smile at each other across one of the two-person tables not far from the fireplace, which is unlit because the soup has been finished off for the evening.

Daryl and Carol saddle up to the center of the bar. "Evening," Gunther tells them, while Santiago waves and Deputy Andrew hastily draws back from Trisha and throws some ammunition on the bar. "I was just getting back on patrol," he assures Carol. "I only stopped a minute." Deputies are supposed to check on the tavern while on patrol, but they aren't supposed to sit and drink. He's probably afraid Carol's going to report his slacking off to the sheriff.

When Andrew's out the door, Trisha goes to serve Daryl and Carol. They order a pint of beer each. "Where's Madam Linda?" Carol asks.

"She got invited to dinner at the Mathwins," Trisha says. Carol tries to think who the Mathwins are and can't place the name. "I think they're playing Bridge tonight." Trisha leans with one hand on the bar near Gunther and asks, "So, speaking of Madam Linda, how was your hot date with her on Friday?"

"He almost forgot it," Carol says with a light smile.

"You didn't!" Trisha scolds him.

"The time got away from me." Gunther pushes his empty pint forward and also sets a small amount of tobacco on the bar.

Trisha takes the glass to refill it, while Santiago says, "It's not fair you have a green thumb. Talk about money growing on trees. Keep this up, and you're going to raise the prices for everyone."

"I never pegged you for an economist," Gunther replies.

"While I was in the Border Patrol, I took a few college classes over the years," Santiago says. "I never got a degree or anything. My work schedule was too erratic. And for a while we all had sixty-hour weeks."

"She really likes you, you know." Trisha slides Gunther's refilled pint back to him. "Madam Linda."

"I gathered. I like her, too."

"But not like _that_ , huh?" Trisha asks. "Did you at least throw her a bone and give her a kiss goodnight?"

"A gentleman doesn't kiss and tell." Gunther sips from his pint.

"I'll take that for a no," Trisha says. "Now are you going to buy me a drink to congratulate me?"

"For what?"

"She just got engaged," Candy says from where she stands leaned back against the wall-side of the bar, filing her nails.

"Just now?" Gunther asks.

"Well, no, this afternoon," Trisha says. "Andrew rowed me out on the river. It was _so_ romantic."

"Congratulations!" Dante, overhearing, calls from his table and raises his pint glass to her.

"Maybe I'll be congratulating Inola soon?" Trisha calls back.

Dante shrugs, and Inola half turns in her chair to say, "We should probably date more than a week before we make that call."

"Gather ye rosebuds while you may," Santiago tells them.

"So about that drink – who's buying for me?" Trisha asks.

"Well, Daryl and I are buying to congratulate each other," Carol says, "so…I think we're out."

"Did the adoption go through?" Santiago asks.

Carol nods and smiles.

"What does that make me?" Santiago asks. "My son found her and kept her alive for two weeks, and then you adopted her…I feel like that makes me something."

"It doesn't make ya shit," Daryl tells him.

"It sounds like congratulations are in order," Gunther says, "to the new mother, and to the bride-to-be. A round of drinks on me for the two worthy ladies."

"Hey, if you buy for _two_ ladies, you have to buy for them _all_ ," Candy insists.

"Then a round for all the ladies, on me!" Gunther exclaims. "Congratulations to all y'all for all the congratulatory things!"

"Thank you, Gunther," Inola says from her table. "But we should probably get going." She stands and puts a hand on Dante's shoulder. "We have an early morning tomorrow."

After Dante follows her out, pausing to open the saloon door for her, Gunther counts the women at the bar silently, moving his finger from Trisha to Carol to Candy and then to himself. "Get me a shot of shine while you're at it, too." He throws a folded over paper stuffed with tobacco down on the bar. "That's the last I brought."

"Save some," Daryl tells him. "Ya ain't buyin' for Carol. I got 'er covered."

"Suit yourself," replies Gunther, and then to Trisha, "Credit it to my tab then."

"Gunther loves to throw money around," Candy says. "You should let him. I always do."

"I grew up poor," Gunther says. "It feels good to be a big man on campus for a change."

Candy looks over Daryl's shoulder and mutters, "We _always_ get one thirty minutes before closing."

Santiago turns his head and smiles to see it's the kingdom's knight Sarah, but his smile fades when she angrily closes the distance between then. She stands with one hand on her hip beside the bar. "I've been looking for you since yesterday morning."

Carol exchanges a curious glance with Daryl.

"Oh?" Santiago asks innocently.

"You were just being generous, were you, relieving me early on watch? Just wanted me to spend time with my boyfriend? Because of your generous spirit?" Sarah plops down on the bar stool on the other side of Santiago. "Moonshine, please, Trisha." She turns to face Santiago. "Well, go ahead."

"Go ahead and what?" Santiago asks.

"Say _I told you so_ , like I know you _want_ to."

"I take no joy in your misery, Sarah," Santiago assures her. "I just thought you deserved to know before you fell too deep. I tried to warn you before."

"I just want to be done with the lying bastard. You know he asked _me_ not to date anyone else? The nerve!"

Trisha puts a shot glass before Sarah. "Sounds like you really need this."

Carol catches Daryl's eye.

"Well, let's just say I'm single again," Sarah says. She holds up a finger and waves it toward Santiago. "Which does not mean I'm letting _you_ take me out."

"So, honey, who'd you catch the captain with?" Candy asks. "Inquiring minds want to know."

"That's his business." Sarah sips her shot of moonshine.

"Oh, no, you can't come in here and start a story and not finish it," Candy insists. "I have an idea! Free drink _on the house_ to whoever guesses correctly."

"Madam Linda isn't going to like it when the accounts don't reconcile," Trisha warns her. "How about one on Gunther for whoever guesses? He's got a one-drink credit on his tab."

Gunther shrugs at being volunteered to pay.

"You can guess all you want," insists Sarah as she turns her shot glass slowly on the bar, "But I'm not talking."

"Oh, come on. Play along!" Candy insists. "The captain _deserves_ it for cheating on you."

"Oh fine."

Daryl shifts uncomfortably on his stool, perhaps because he suspects his hunting partner and friend might be the other party involved.

Sure enough, Santiago immediately guesses, "Mitch."

"Oh you're just saying the only gay man you know of," Candy tells him. "I bet it's Lieutenant Witherspoon. He only came to the whorehouse that one time to pop his cherry. And he _never_ came back."

"So what? That doesn't mean anything except that he has the dignity not to buy it," Santiago insists, and Gunther looks ashamedly into his pint before draining it and switching to the shot of moonshine that was awaiting by its side. " _I_ never went to the whorehouse. You don't think _I'm_ gay, do you?"

"Well he wasn't that into it," Candy replies, "if I remember correctly."

"He didn't see you," Trisha says. "He saw Megan."

Gunther grits his back teeth at the mention of the prostitute he asked to marry him. He downs the rest of the shot of shine and hisses.

"Oh, maybe so," Candy agrees. "All those sailors start to run together after a while. So who's right? Me or Santiago?"

"Neither of you," Sarah answers.

"Harry?" Carol ventures, since he'd been her first guess for Mitch. Then she immediately regrets allowing her curiosity to persuade her to join the gossip. She can tell Daryl is becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the conversation. He's been studying his pint glass, turning it all the way around by the handle, sipping, and turning again.

"Oh, Harry's not gay," Candy says. " _Trust_ _me._ "

"Why do _all_ of you assume it was a _man_?" Sarah exclaims.

"It wasn't?" Candy, Carol, and Santiago ask in surprised unison.

"Let the record show I did _not_ assume it was a man," Gunther says. "Was I _supposed_ to assume it was a man?"

"Well, he's just so… _tidy_ ," Santiago says.

"And so good-looking!" Candy insists. "I mean, no man's _that_ good-looking unless he's trying to attract another man."

Gunther leans forward to look down the bar over Santiago to Sarah. "The fact that you were hesitant to say it leads me to believe it's a _married_ woman."

"A _married_ woman?" Trisha repeats, wide eyed. "You caught him with a _married_ woman? _Who_?"

Sarah throws back the last of her shot of moonshine, hisses, and slaps the glass on the bar. "I don't want to be the gossip who breaks up someone else's marriage."

"Don't you think _he_ deserves to know?" Santiago asks. "The woman's husband?"

"Maybe he _does_ know," Sarah says. "And maybe he's chosen to ignore it."

"Who the fuck would choose to ignore it?" Daryl asks, contributing to the conversation for the first time.

Santiago raises his pint toward him. "Agreed."

"Oh, I don't know," Gunther says. "I'm sure it happens. Men don't want to lose the women they love, especially in a world with so few women."

Candy tilts her head. "Says the man who used to imagine himself in love with a whore."

"Candy," Trisha scolds. "Why do you always have to be so hard on Gunther? A man can't help who he loves."

"Maybe not, but he can help who he _pretends_ to love," Sarah mutters.

"I never liked that Captain Cummins," Santiago says. "I warned you."

"But you told me you voted for him for Council," Trisha observes.

"Oh, I _voted_ for him," Santiago agrees. "I just never _liked_ him." He slides off his stool. "Well, I don't like to leave Raul alone too long. I'm headed back to my cabin."

"He didn't want to join you?" Carol asks.

"He doesn't like to waste tobacco on booze. He'd rather trade it for preserves instead. He keeps the mason jars under his bed. Some day he'll figure out all the fields and fish aren't going to suddenly vanish, I hope, and relax a little."

Sarah pushes her empty glass forward on the bar. "I'll walk back with you as far as the fort."

"I'll go with y'all. I need to head back to the barracks," Gunther says. He tips his straw hat to the waitresses. "Keep the change. And tell Madam Linda I said hello."

When they're gone, Daryl and Carol finish their pints of beer quietly while Candy and Trisha start rinsing and drying out the abandoned glasses and packing them away. The waitresses gossip with each other about what mystery married woman is sleeping with Captain Cummins.

Carol bumps Daryl's shoulder with her own. "Sorry to catch you up in a bunch of gossip. I thought it would be a quiet evening out."

Daryl turns his head slightly to hold her eyes. "Ya know, deputy," he tells her, "when this woman's husband finds out, 'n the shit hits the fan, yer gonna have yer work cut our for ya. Just better hope all ya gotta do is break up a fight."

Carol sighs.


	97. Chapter 97

_**A/N:** _Sorry this chapter is so short, but I've been on vacation for awhile and just wanted to get a little something out as soon as I got back. It might be a few days before I can update with a full-length chapter again.

[*]

Lying on his side in bed, Daryl tickles Sweetheart's stomach through her pink onesie. She squeals and flails her little legs against the rumpled sheets. Her tiny hand clasps Daryl's calloused fingertip. She draws it to her mouth and suckles. Carol's handgun clicks into the holster. She slides open her top dresser drawer to retrieve her knife. "You're not hunting this morning?"

"Later," Daryl replies. "Mitch wants to go after sunset. Get some beaver."

"I didn't think Mitch was interested in beaver."

"Pfft. Stahp."

"They're nocturnal?"

"Mhmhm. 'S when they build." Daryl leans down and pretends to eat Sweetheart's hand. This causes her to laugh and release his fingertip.

Carol snaps the sheath of her knife shut. "I hate it when you hunt after dark."

"Always come back alive. 'N this way I can get more work done on the cabin today."

"Does beaver taste good?" She can't remember if she's eaten beaver before, though Daryl's probably fed it to her at some point in the past eight years.

"Tough n' chewy but tastes like grass-fed beef, 'cept there's an aftertaste of liver."

"Eww. Not a fan of liver. Had it too much growing up because it was cheap."

"'N hunters get to keep the pelts. Could trade 'em. Pelts 're good for hats 'n capes n' linin' boots."

"Capes? Who's wearing a cape around here?"

"Cap'n wants one for his uniform."

"Of course he does," Carol says with a roll of her eyes.

"Oh, ya find out he's fuckin' someone else's wife and suddenly ya ain't so googly eyed over him?"

"I was _never_ googly eyed over him."

"Might want one myself," Daryl says.

"One what?"

"A cape."

Carol splutter laughs.

Daryl frowns.

She smiles. "Well, you _do_ look pretty damn good in a poncho." She leans down and kisses Sweetheart's forehead. "I have to get going soon. I have morning patrol. Shannon fed her just before you woke up. So you'll probably have to change her diaper soon."

Daryl squishes up his nose. "Can't Shannon do that?"

"Shannon's not her parent."

"She's the godmamma."

" _You're_ the father."

"Don't know how to change a diaper," Daryl grumbles.

"You built a motorcycle to run on fuel distilled from corn. I think you can figure out the diaper."

Daryl sighs. "Miss my bike. Hope Aaron's takin' good care of 'er."

"Maybe you can build yourself another one, when you're done with the cabin." Carol slides an extra, loaded magazine into her magazine pouch. "Believe it or not, I miss your bike, too. Well…I miss _seeing_ you on it. It was kind of sexy."

Daryl grins. "Yeah?"

She smiles and sits on the edge of the bed on the other side of the baby. She plays with Sweetheart's tiny toes until the baby giggles, and then she catches Daryl's eyes. "How would you feel about getting her christened? In the chapel?"

" _Feel_?" Daryl asks.

"What would you _think_ of it?"

"Think 's silly. Ain't like she's old 'nuff to know what she believes."

Carol looks away. "That's not what it's about," she says softly. "She can decide that when she's older, and, if she _does_ choose to believe, she can confirm her faith then."

"Yeah? So what's the point, then? 'S magic water?"

Carol's mouth purses into a stern line. "You don't have to mock me."

"Sorry," Daryl mutters. "Just don't get the point."

"To me it's about making a promise to raise her in a certain way, with certain values, and asking for our friends to help us raise her that way. And it's about asking for God's protection over her. A kid could use a little extra help in this world. And we could ask Garland and Shannon to be the godparents, so we know that if anything ever happens to us, she has someone good who's promised to look out for her."

Daryl tickles Sweetheart's stomach again, and the baby gurgles. "'S important to ya?" he asks.

"Yes. It would make me feel…good. Reassured."

"A'ight then."

"Even though you think it's silly?" Carol asks.

"Fuck's it matter if I think it's silly? Makes ya happy, and it ain't even hard to do."

Carol laughs. "I love you." She leans over the baby and kisses him.

When she pulls away, he asks, "This don't mean I got to go _every_ Sunday, does it?"

"No. Just for the christening."

"Good."

"And her first communion."

"A'ight."

"And her confirmation if she chooses to go that route."

"Mhmhm."

"And her wedding."

" _Stahp_. Ain't no man gonna be good 'nuff for her."

Carol smiles. She stands and clips her deputy star onto her shirt. "Do you have any help today? On the cabin?"

"Santiago's kid."

"You've really taken Raul under your wing."

"Hard worker."

"Does he seem to be settling to you?" she asks.

"Man can't never settle in this world," Daryl mutters.

"You have, haven't you?"

"Mhmhm. More than I expected to anyhow. But ya always got to be ready for shit."

"Well, good thing you always are. Don't forget to change that diaper." She slaps him playfully on the ass before leaving the room.


	98. Chapter 98

Today, Carol's patrol covers the entire length of the town, from the Indian Village through the fort and to the docks that lead to the museum. In the village she peers through a hut's open window on Bob and Mary, who are fighting again as Bob prepares to head off to work. They stop when they see her and frown in unison. At least their fighting these days has been confined to words instead of blows, and for a sweet moment they seem to be united by a common enemy. "Mind your own business, deputy," Mary mutters, and Bob echoes, "Damn right."

Carol smiles thinly and walks on. Dante is sanding a turned-over wood and wicker rocking chair outside of Inola's hut. "All moved in?" she asks him.

"Yeah." He stands from where he's kneeling, flips the chair upright, and sets it on its rockers. "Thought I'd upgrade her from the camp chairs. They're getting a bit worn."

"You built that?"

"Mhmhm."

"We might need you to make us a bed frame when the cabin's done."

"Well, I can always use some more ammo. But, you know…" He gives her a look that's half grinning, half warning. "Daryl can probably make a bedframe."

Carol looks over the perfectly sanded chair and beautifully carved arms. "I'm sure he can," she agrees. But he won't make one like _that_. Dante's right, however. Daryl might get his feathers ruffled if she asks another man to do for her what he's capable of doing. "We should hold onto more of our ammo anyway."

Inola emerges from the beaded doorway of the hut and greets Carol. She kisses Dante on the cheek. "I have to repair a few spots in the brick walkway in the settlement," she tells him. "I'll be done around noon if you want to do lunch."

He grins. "Lunch. _Yeah_."

Inola chuckles, waves goodbye to Carol, and heads out. Carol continues her rounds. She's stopped to record a few complaints, most of them petty. She peers in the chapel, where the preschoolers are playing duck-duck-goose on the altar stage. Gary waves to her. She walks past the jailhouse and looks out on the dirt field at the 8-11 year olds having recess under the supervision of a teacher and an aide. Two girls swing jump ropes while two more jump between them. Three boys play horseshoes. A gaggle of five more children are playing freeze tag.

Carol peers in the one-room schoolhouse where the 5-7 year-olds sit in rows at old wooden desks and work math problems on their individual chalkboard slates. Soon the groups will switch out, and the older kids will be forced to do their more advanced math lessons while the younger ones play. In a little over four years, Sweetheart will sit at one of those old wooden desks, Carol thinks. VanDaryl will be in her class eventually, and Gary, too, at least for a few months before he moves into the upper school. At least four of those preschool kids she saw in the chapel are young enough to one day be Sweetheart's classmates, and Judge Ana Carter's baby-to-be will join her also. Who knows how many other babies will be born within the next two years also. She'll have more near-age peers than Henry ever did in the Kingdom. She might not have to move away from home at fifteen, like he did, in search of love. By the time Sweetheart's ten, they might need a _two-room_ schoolhouse.

[*]

Later, as Carol passes one of the fields on the way to the docks, she can see Gunther holding the handles of a horse-drawn plow while a farm hand walks beside him steering the horse by its reins. The plow gets stuck, and the men's cursing fills the air and floats toward the dirt path as they struggle to unlodge it.

When Carol's on the docks, Captain Cummins stops her to exchange pleasantries. His charm is turned up full blast, perhaps in compensation for the fact that rumors of his relationship with a married woman have begun to fan through Jamestown. Married fishermen and sailors heading for the ships, as well as farmers heading for the fields, cast him suspicious glances as they pass by on the wooden planks, while some of the single men smirk in semi-admiration.

"The ballot is up," he tells her. "It's posted just inside the Council Chambers. Have you seen it?"

"Not yet," she replies, "I'll take a look at the end of my patrol."

"There are a few surprises."

"Are you still running?" she asks.

Captain Cummin's smile falters on his handsome face. "Why _wouldn't_ I be?"

"Well," she replies, "you said there are a few surprises. I thought that might be one of them."

"No, no, I'm running of course. Maybe even for mayor. I mean, I fully expect Garland to win that position again, but…getting my name out there will help for the next election cycle."

"Well, you've done a great job of getting your name out there," Carol deadpans. "Have a good afternoon on the river today."

He warily tips his captain's hat to her as she walks on.

Outside the museum, Sarah and Santiago stand by the long garden that sports the flags. Sarah has a long bow slung over her shoulder and a quiver on her back, while Santiago rests a hand on the butt of his revolver. Carol stops to say hello. "Are either of you on patrol?" She thought she had the whole town for the next two hours.

"Not yet," Santiago says. "But I relieve you when your shift is up. In the meantime…" He half bows to the Kingdom's knight. "Sarah's promised to teach me to use a bow properly."

"He claims he's concerned about running out of ammo one day," Sarah says skeptically.

"It's a useful skill," Carol assures him. "Even though we have more guns and ammo here than we did in the Kingdom, I try to keep up with my archery practice. It wouldn't hurt you to learn it."

Santiago smiles at Sarah. "No, I think it would be a _pleasure_ to learn it. I need to go fill my canteen before we set out to the range." He leaves them and heads into the museum.

"You're really not going to give him a second chance?" Carol asks. "I kind of like him."

"I kind of like him, too. I thought he wasn't much of a gentleman at first, but it turns out he's more of one than the charming captain. Or at least he's _honest_. But if I tell him I'm giving him a second chance too soon, I'll miss out on all the preliminary flirting."

"Ah." Carol chuckles. She bids Sarah good luck and heads into the museum. She swings a left and walks by Garland's office, where he's busy at work, and waves. He looks up briefly and nods before returning to his papers – inventory, most likely. She passes the infirmary next, where Dr. Ahmad's wife Tammara has stopped by to give him his forgotten lunch. There's a patient in the bed, resting, a man who, if the rumors are true, broke his leg falling off the roof of the gristmill when he was trying to fix it, because he'd had a little too much Jamestown brew before his endeavor.

"Don't work so late tonight," Tamarra tells her husband. "It feels like it's been ages since we had dinner together. And Emily can take an extra shift."

"It's Council work I do in the evening, darling. Emily can't cover that." Dr. Ahmad nods through the open door. "Morning, Carol."

"Good morning," she tells them both.

She rounds the corner and finds Lieutenant Witherspoon sitting in the library chair and reading. He tells her it's his day off and he was looking for a quiet place to hide. "The ballot's up. I see you're running for Council."

"I am," she replies.

"So am I, but with Captain Cummins and Commander Lawson both on the ballot…I doubt people will want another sailor. Unless they're looking for younger representation." The lieutenant is twenty-four, and the youngest person on the council, currently, is thirty-one.

"Commander Lawson?" she asks. She's only met the commander in passing, knows nothing about him, and had no idea he was running for Council. "Is he well respected?"

"He does his job," the lieutenant answers vaguely.

"Does he have any interesting policy ideas?" she asks.

"Well, he wants an indefinite moratorium on taking in refugees."

Carol doesn't like that idea. "And what do you think of that?" After all, the lieutenant was brought here by his parents as a teenager, at the very start of the Great Sickness. He's lived through the clearing and the building and the expansion, both major raids and the mutiny. He's as close to native-born as an adult Jamestownian can be. Perhaps he agrees.

"I think it's ridiculous. We were nearly all refugees once. They _Mayor_ was a refugee once. You and Daryl saved Jamestown, and you were refugees when you did it…well, sort of." He smiles bashfully. "You were refugees the second time you came, anyway."

"Do you think he has much support for the idea?" Carol asks.

"Some. Some people are still angry about their losses from that raid that happened back in 6 NE, which never would have happened if we hadn't taken in that refugee. We can't turn everyone away, though. We have vetting process, after all. It isn't _perfect_ , but as my father used to say, you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good."

"It's a wise saying. You have good day, lieutenant."

As she heads back down the hall, she runs into Mitch, who seems startled to see her there. "Headed to the library?" she asks.

"Uh…yeah. Thought I'd check out a book. Daryl and I aren't hunting until the evening."

"He told me." Carol wonders now if Lieutenant Witherspoon is Mitch's sailor. Candy seemed so sure the lieutenant was gay, and that Harry _wasn't_. And it's become clear that Captain Cummin's lover is _not_ a man after all. But the lieutenant isn't much older than Harry, and this, too, would be a May-December romance. The lieutenant, however, is noticeably more mature than Harry. In fact, Carol's mulling over the possibility of voting for him. "What do you like to read?" Carol asks Mitch.

"Uh…you know. Books."

Carol smiles. "Have a good morning." She patrols on, checks in at the theater and then the laundry room, where Dwight is at work ironing the orphans' freshly cleaned sheets. It's a strange sight to see, the iron in his hand, the iron branded to his face.

He looks up from his work. "Good morning, Carol." .

A sudden flash of rage runs up like heartburn through her chest. She has a vision of Dwight kicking a plate with a dog food sandwich across a cement floor to a stripped-bate Daryl, closing an iron door, and turning up the music. She pushes down the anger, bit by bit, until she can calmly reply, "Good morning."

"How's Alexandra?"

"She's doing great. Where's Sherri?"

"At the schoolhouse. Or the chapel. They were short a teacher's aide today. She's sick. So Sherri's filling in."

Carol nods and walks on, peeks in on the armory, says hello to Carter, one of the former Kingdom people, a gunsmith assigned to the armory. He asks her to come in and leads her to one of the shelves and points. "We're short a box of .223. I rescan the shelves every time I come in."

Carol takes out her notebook. "And you just noticed this morning?"

"Yes. No one signed it out on the inventory sheets. Mayor Garland's reviewing them now to see if it was an accounting error, but I don't think it was."

"When do you think it went missing?"

"It was there yesterday morning when I came in, so sometime in the last 24 hours," Carter answers.

"Who's had access to the armory in the last 24 hours?"

"Me of course." He glances at the notepad. "Drake and Don. They reload ammunition. Paul, he's the other gunsmith. The mayor of course. He checks inventory and sets aside boxes for weekly rationing. Oh, and uh…this kid. Raul? He volunteered to help clean brass for an hour yesterday to earn some extra ammo."

Carol presses her pencil to the notebook so hard that the lead tip snaps. She curses. Carter pulls a pencil out of his front pocket and hands it to her. "Trade you."

"Thank you." She takes his pencil and scratches Raul's name across the pad. "I'll look into it." With heavy steps, she leaves the armory and swings back to the mayor's office. Leaned against the open frame of the doorway, she says, "Please tell me the missing ammo is just an accounting error?"

Garland closes the open manila folder on his desk and leans back in his chair. "I wish I could tell you I'd made a mistake in the accounts, but I haven't. It's missing."

"Who has keys to the armory?" Carol asks.

"Me, the gunsmiths, and the sheriff. Earl."

"No one else?" She was hoping there might be more suspects to consider, because she doesn't want this to have been Raul.

"That's it."

"I'll do the interviews."

"Well, I didn't steal it, deputy," Garland says with a light smile. He leans forward in his chair to get back to work. "Good luck."

Carol walks through the empty orphanage. The kids are in school or at their apprenticeships, and the mattresses have been stripped bare for laundry day. She walks down the hallway and into the empty Council Chambers / museum to look at the ballot. The information has been neatly written by hand, in a combination of print and cursive, on four sheets of taped-together printer paper that has been tacked to a free-standing sign board:

 **CANDIDATES FOR COUNCIL  
 _Election Date:_ July 1, 8 NE  
 _Installation Date:_ July 2, 8 NE**

 **Garland Barron, _mayor, councilman, incumbent_  
Captain David Cummins, _Naval officer, navigator, councilman, incumbent_  
Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad, _doctor,_ _clinic supervisor, councilman, incumbent_  
Commander Jeffrey Lawson, _Naval_ _officer, fishing manager_**

The commander must be one of the surprises Captain Cummins was talking about, Carol thinks.

 **Lieutenant James Witherspoon, _Naval_ _officer, fisherman_  
Inola ****Chotka, _mason_  
Judge Anna Carter, _judge, councilwoman, incumbent_**

Carol takes pause at that name, because Anna said she was declining to run because of her pregnancy. She must have changed her mind.

 **Barry Borowsky, _hunter, councilman, incumbent_  
Dr. Carolyn Taylor, _veterinarian, councilwoman, incumbent_**

Carol wouldn't mind if she beat out the veterinarian for Council after some of the irritating questions Carolyn asked during the adoption hearing. Carolyn was also somewhat noncommittal about the idea of establishing a regular trade route to Oceanside.

 **Gunther Hamilton** , **_assistant farm manager  
_** **Deputy Carol Dixon, _sheriff's_ _deputy, guard, patrolwoman_**

There she is. Carol wonders if the order of the names has any significance. They clearly aren't alphabetical. Maybe they appear in the order that the petitions were submitted.

 **Deputy Thomas Mayfield, _sheriff's deputy, patrolman, field medic  
_ Deputy Andrew Davies, _sheriff's deputy, bailiff, patrolman_**

She has more competition than she originally anticipated. That's already thirteen people for nine slots, but there's one more name on the list:

 **Daryl Dixon, _hunter and legend_**

"What the fuck?" Carol asks the empty room.


	99. Chapter 99

"Heave!" Daryl yells, and Raul pulls the rope through the pully on his side as Daryl does the same on his. "Heave!" The log rises in the air above the eight-foot wall of the cabin. "Set!" They slacken the ropes little by little until the log is resting in place in the wood slats that will hold it temporarily until the chinking is complete.

 _The last log._

 _Finally._

Daryl drops the rope, steps back, and draws an arm across his brow to wipe away the sweat. He looks at the completed foundation and cabin walls. He has to chink between that last two row of logs, let it dry, and sand all the logs inside and out, and then he can begin on the roof. He'll need to cover the windows – either with wood shutters like Garland and Shannon have or roll-down paper blinds like Dante and Inola have in their hut. The blinds will be easier, but he suspects Carol won't like them as well. She'll definitely want a wooden door, with a lock, and not some beaded entryway. And though he'd be happy to leave the cabin with an earthen floor, she's going to want him to lay wood planks like the Barrons eventually did.

Their sturdy log cabin is going to stick out like a sore thumb among all these wattle and daub, thatched-roof old Jamestown settlement homes. He'll look like the richest kid on the block for once in his life. He wishes he could put a big ol' satellite dish right on the roof, too, and three motorcycles in the front yard, next to the biggest ass pickup truck you ever saw. But Carol probably wouldn't like that even if he could.

"I have to be to the fields for my regular job in two hours." Raul lowers the canteen he just sipped from. "And I want to eat lunch and sit a bit first. So you have me for another hour. What do you need next?"

"'S chink 'tween those top two rows. I'll mix – " Daryl falls silent because Carol, her deputy star glistening in the late morning sun, is pacing in their direction. She looks upset. Angry, almost. She comes to a stop a few feet from the men.

"I need to talk to you," she says with thinly veiled irritation.

"Me?" Raul asks nervously.

"Well, you, too, later, but Daryl for right now."

"A'ight," Daryl replies warily, looking over the stern line of her jaw and the coolness in her usually soft blue eyes. He's seen that expression before, knows well enough to know when she's holding a cap on something. He just hopes that pent-up anger doesn't have anything to do with something _he_ did wrong. He doesn't _think_ he did anything wrong. But Merle always told him you never can tell what might set a woman off. He can tell, with Carol, though. Most of the time. But right now, he's clueless as a dog who's blind in one eye and can't see out the other.

"Not here," she says, which makes him even more nervous, because if they have an audience, she can't get _too_ mad. "Let's go for a walk."

Daryl glances at Raul, who looks relieved that he's not in trouble with the deputy, but also a little concerned for Daryl. "Start mixin' up the chinking."

As Daryl falls instep beside Carol, he slides his canteen from out of the pouch on his belt and screws the metal cap free. If he's drinking, he can't be expected to talk right away. Besides, he's thirsty from the work. He takes one sip and holds the water in his mouth for a moment.

With forced calm, Carol asks, "Why didn't you tell me you were planning to run for Council?"

Daryl swallows the water down quickly and coughs.

"All this time I've been talking about running myself, collecting signatures on my petition, discussing the competition, you haven't said a _word_."

Daryl finishes the last of his cough. "Hell ya talkin' 'bout?"

"I saw the ballot today. In the museum."

"What ballot?" They're passing the Barron family cabin now. Through the open window, Daryl can hear Shannon singing to VanDaryl as she puts him down for his late morning nap. Sweetheart's coo, too, filters through the air and twists his heart with its strange familiarity.

Carol must hear it, because she instinctively turns and looks toward the window before passing on. "The ballot with all the names of everyone running for Council election," she says. "You're on it. Daryl Dixon. Hunter and legend."

"The fuck?"

"That's what I said when I saw it."

A soccer ball hits Daryl's ankle. He kicks it back to the school children playing outside. A little boy stops it with his foot and says, "Thanks, Mr. Dixon!" Daryl has no idea why the kid knows his name. Daryl certainly doesn't know the boy's.

"You mean you didn't submit a petition?" Carol asks as they stroll on.

"Nah," he answers as they pass the chapel. "'Course not. Ya think I'd do that without tellin' ya?"

"No," she admits quietly. "I didn't. But then I saw your name up there and I didn't know how else…I mean, you need twenty signatures. You have to fill out the form and – "

"And ya think I filled it out and wrote _legend_ in the occupation blank?"

She laughs. "Well…"

He shrugs. "Well, I guess if I _was_ gonna run…" He smirks.

"It was a shock to see your name on that ballot, without you having said anything, and I feared…"

"- Feared what?" he asks.

"That maybe I don't know you as well as I've always assumed I did."

"Pffft. Know me better'n I know m'self."

She smiles. "I'm sorry I thought you'd do that without mentioning it to me." She sighs and shakes her head. "You know, I won't win against you. They won't elect us both."

"Well I ain't runnin' anyhow."

"You're _in_ the running. _Someone_ must have gathered all the signatures and submitted that petition on your behalf."

"Don't matter. Just gonna decline the nomination. Be off the ballot."

"They want you," she says quietly. "So much that they put you on the ballot, got the signatures easily, without word even getting to you about it…" She sighs and rests a hand on the hilt of her handgun. "Maybe you _should_ be the one to run instead of me."

"Don't want it! Don't wanna attend all them council meetin's, n' I sure as shit don't wanna sit at open town halls listenin' to people bitch. And ain't gonna be no good at it. I ain't 'zactly the most politic guy."

"You were on the council back at the prison. You were on the council in the Kingdom."

"Yeah, 'cause 'm yer husband."

"Not in the prison you weren't."

"Well, Rick was looney tunes for a while. Wouldn't of needed me otherwise. And those meetin's were like…fifteen minutes."

"You advised Tara and Jesus and Aaron, too, back at the Hilltop. You were part of their inner circle. People value your opinion."

"Value yours, too."

"I don't know." Carol's hand falls to her side again. "I was on the council in the prison, and I still got exiled. I was only queen of the Kingdom because I married the king, and he died."

"Ya know that ain't true. Ya know that ain't the only reason."

"I don't know if people really will want my opinion here. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world to gather those signatures." In the end, she let Daryl sign the last line. "Over six hundred people in Jamestown, and it took me three weeks to gather just twenty signatures. But they'll listen to you. Daryl Dixon. Hunter and _legend_."

"Stahp." They pass the long quarter house, which serves as housing for four families, without speaking. "Carol, yer gonna win a seat. 'N if ya don't, they're goddamn idiots."

"Maybe it's not my time this time."

"Aigh't. Maybe it ain't. Be yer time next time if not this time, though. Hey." He stops walking and puts a hand on her shoulder. "Ya want this bad?"

"I don't know why, exactly, but…yes."

He squeezes her shoulder. "Then go for it hard." He slides his hand up and down in a gentle rub of her shoulder for a moment before dropping his hand and walking on again. "'N don't worry. 'M names comin' off that fuckin' list. 'N when I find out who put it on there, 'm gonna kick his ass."

"What if it's a woman?"

"'N I'll kick her in the tits."

Carol splutter laughs. "You will not. You'll say thank you for the honor, I'm flattered by your faith in me, but I'd rather commit to serving the community in other ways, and so I humbly decline."

"See, that's why ya make a better politician. Never would of thought of that."

"Who do you think it was?"

"No idea," he mutters. He follows Carol as she rounds the edge of the triangular part of the settlement without going on to where the greenhouses and pens are.

She's headed back toward their cabin-to-be. "Twenty people signed it without you knowing, without mentioning it to you. I wonder who?"

"Dunno."

"Do you think Garland and Shannon signed it?"

"Think it would of come up if they had."

"How's Raul doing? How does he seem to be doing to you?"

Daryl's puzzled by the sudden change in subject, but also relieved by it. "Kid's a damn hard worker. Don't talk much. 'N 's fine by me."

"I'm afraid he may have taken a box of .223 ammo from the armory when he was putting in extra time there yesterday."

"Shiiiit."

"I need to interview him when we get back to the building site, before he goes to his next job."

"Guess 'm on my own for the chinkin' then."


	100. Chapter 100

Raul follows Carol to a wooden bench and sits down beside her. The young man seems nervous, though Carol doesn't know if that's because he merely senses he's in trouble or because he knows precisely _why_ he's in trouble. She hopes it's the former. He scratches his baby smooth cheek, which he must have shaved this morning. His hair is as dark as his father's, but Raul's skin tone is a lighter, milky brown.

"Do you know why I want to talk to you?" Carol asks him.

"No, ma'am," he answers while looking away. "Deputy."

"Were you helping to reload ammo in the armory yesterday?"

His eyes flit back. "Yes. Why?"

"Because an entire box of .223 has gone missing from the shelves."

"It wasn't me!" he exclaims, his eyes widening with alarm. "Deputy, I swear, it _wasn't_ me. This time. "

"Raul," she says softly, "I know you lived a long time alone before finding that cult, and I know how they treated you. I know how hungry you were when – "

"- It wasn't me. I want to stay here. With my dad. I don't want to be thrown out. Listen, why would I need to take it? I do my twenty hours in the fields. And then I do extra. Daryl pays me in tobacco. I was paid in ammo to reload ammo. I made seven rounds at the armory, but I didn't take any more than that!"

"Would you mind if I took a look in your cabin just to confirm the ammo's not there?" Carol asks.

"Don't you need some kind of warrant for that?" Raul asks. "I mean, Jamestown has rules, right?"

"I just need your permission."

"But…if I don't give my permission?"

"Then I can get a warrant from Judge Carter in about ten minutes. Which I suppose would be just long enough for you to hide the box somewhere else if you took it. Raul, did you take that ammunition?"

He shakes his head. "No, I swear. I didn't."

"Then just let me confirm it's nowhere in your cabin."

Raul swallows and nods. "Okay."

The one-room cabin looks very much like its lived in by two bachelors. Dirty dishes remain unrinsed and undried in the plastic soapy tub on the center of the wooden kitchen table. The cot in one corner and the mattress in the other are covered with crumpled sheets and blankets, and a shirt hangs over the back of the love seat before the coffee table chest. A free-standing coat rack is sloppily draped with all the unused fall and winter coats and jackets.

While Raul lingers uneasily near the closed front door, Carol examines the shelves of the hutch, which seem to be stocked with a week's worth of rations for two, as well as a couple of small jars of moonshine. She opens the cabinet doors to find tin cups and plates, silverware, an iron skillet, a pot, creased cloth napkins, and several spare knives in sheaths. The doors close with a creak. She scans the room and spies a box of ammo on the mantle, but it's 9 mm, standard monthly issue for a deputy's handgun, and no doubt Santiago's. She clears the junk off the coffee table chest – books and magazines and the disassembled parts of a rifle – and opens it. Inside she finds the neatest, most orderly scene in the entire cabin: the contents are carefully stacked and organized so that every inch of space can be filled. Canned and jarred food, vacuum sealed dried fish, bags of rice and beans, bottled water, jerky, and more line the inside of the chest.

"I bought all that," Raul insists. "From the communal pantry. Or I traded others for it. I didn't steal any of that. I bought it with what Daryl pays me and with what I earned from other odd jobs."

She believes him because nothing has been reported missing from storage, the communal pantry, or anyone's cabin or hut. "That's a lot of food for two people," she says. "It's wise to store up a little extra, but don't work yourself to death."

"What else is there to do but work?" Raul asks.

Carol shrugs. "Go to the movies with friends?"

"I don't have any friends."

The matter-of-fact way he says that stabs Carol with a jolt of sadness. After his abuse at the hands of that cult leader, he shies away from men, even teenagers close to his age, she supposes. He's more relaxed with women and teenage girls, but there aren't a lot near his age here. Raul does have Barry's daughter interested in him, but Daryl thinks she's trouble, that she's just trying to make her boyfriend jealous – the boyfriend she's broken up with and gotten back together with three times in the last three weeks. Raul, to his credit, seems to have figured that out and refuses to play into her games.

Carol shuts the chest. She goes over to the cot and draws out one of the cardboard boxes beneath it. It's stuffed with Raul's shirts, underwear, pants, and socks. She pulls out another box which holds an extra pair of boots, a leather belt, a gutting knife, a spare holster, a few paperback novels, and about a dozen Playboy and Hustler magazines.

Raul has stepped farther inside the cabin. He's blushing fiercely and looking at the dirt floor when she slides the box back under the cot. "My dad and I go scavenging once a week," he mutters. "So I can find stuff to trade. I found those in the attic of an old house. I was going to trade them for food to some of the men in the barracks. I just haven't gotten around to it yet."

"Mhmhm," she says and stands from her crouched position. She wonders if that alone was why he was so hesitant to have her search the cabin. "Do you have the keys to this footlocker?" She points to the green metal chest against the wall next to Santiago's mattress, a chest the deputy is also using as a nightstand.

"Uh, no. Just my dad does. I think it's just his knives and clothes and stuff."

"Rummaging through my things?" comes Santiago's voice from the suddenly open doorway. He shuts the door behind himself. "Any particular reason?" He walks to the mantle, slides off the deputy's star that's lying next to the box of 9 mm, and pins it to his shirt pocket. He must have come back for the star after practicing archery with Sarah. His shift starts in a few minutes, when Carol's ends.

"A box of .223 went missing from the armory," Carol says.

"And you _automatically_ assumed my son took it?" Santiago asks.

"No. But I'm interviewing everyone who had access to the armory yesterday."

"And are you overturning all _their_ property, too?"

"Dad," Raul says quietly. "You _know_ why she suspects me. You don't have to get angry on my behalf."

"I suppose you want me to open that for you?" Santiago nods to the metal footlocker.

"If you wouldn't mind," Carol tells him.

"I _would_ mind, but to reassure you…" He fishes a ring of keys out of his front shirt pocket. The ring contains a handcuff key, a jail cell key, and two other keys. One of those two he uses to open the footlocker after taking off the oil lamp, notepad, knife, empty glass, and paperback book that lie atop it.

"What's the fourth key for?" Carol asks more out of curiosity than anything else.

"My mistress's apartment," he answers dryly. Carol sighs. Santiago smiles indulgently as he opens the lid of the footlocker. "It used to be for my pickup," he tells her. "I just never took it off the chain when the gas spoiled." He stands from his crouched position and waves at the chest. "Gaze upon the contents of my sad bachelor's life."

Carol rifles through the chest just long enough to be assured there is no box of .223 inside. There's only a box of .44 for the rifle that's leaned against the hutch. There are also three worn, well-creased, loose photographs on top of the clothes. Two are of a woman that, from the third photo, Carol can surmise was Santiago's wife and Raul's mother. The third is a family photo. Raul looks about twelve in it, and he's barely recognizable as the young man he's become. She's amazed Santiago was able to hold onto those personal mementos for so long. "Sorry I had to do this," she says and shuts the lid. "I know it's invasive."

"Now that I'm on duty," Santiago tells her as he opens the front door of the cabin and waves her out. "I'll finish the interviews." Carol exits the cabin, and Santiago follows, leaving Raul behind to make his lunch. "Who else had access to the armory?" Santiago asks as he shuts the door behind himself.

"The gunsmiths," Carol answers. "Carter and Paul. I talked to Paul already." She knocked that interview out before coming to see Daryl and Raul. "He didn't send up any red flags. I'll give you my notes. Then there's Drake and Don, who do the reloading. I haven't tracked them down yet, but they're probably at the armory for work by now. Earl has a set of keys. And Garland, of course. I spoke to Garland. He confirmed it wasn't an inventory miscount."

"And you interviewed Carter?"

"He's the one who reported it," Carol says.

"And a thief never tries to cover his own tracks by reporting as missing the very thing he stole?"

"I've known Carter for five years. Carter's no thief. He was a loyal subject of the Kingdom."

"I'll interview him," Santiago insists. "We've never had any trouble with Don or Drake or Paul. Well, Don, once. Drunk and disorderly. But who hasn't had one of those?"

"Have you?" Carol asks with a faint smile.

" _Once_. After a few pints. I got into a brawl over a woman. I suppose I lost, because eventually she married the other guy."

"Who is she?" Carol asks. "The woman you brawled over?"

"Ana Carter."

"Earl's wife?" Carol asks in surprise. "You got in a fight with the _sheriff_ over the judge?"

"He wasn't the sheriff _then_ ," Santiago says. "He was just the bailiff. And a deputy. Garland was still sheriff, and Garland left us both in the tank for a day. But in retrospect I'm glad she chose Earl. I don't think Ana and I are well suited to each other. She's a bit of a starched shirt."

Carol chuckles. Earl's a bit of a starched shirt sometimes, she thinks. In fact, she can't really imagine Earl in a drunken brawl. "Ana told me she wasn't going to run again because of her pregnancy, but I guess she changed her mind. Her name's on the ballot."

"Captain Cummins talked her into it," Santiago says. "Told her she's not one to sit around the cabin playing house."

"Why does the captain care if she runs?" Carol asks.

Santiago shrugs. "I guess he thinks she's a good councilwoman. If she wins, the baby won't be born until her term's almost half up. She's not even showing yet. And they're easy to lug around when they aren't crawling. Maria used to bring Raul to her secretary's job for the first six months. She just wore him around, and he slept most of the time."

Carol snorts. "I wouldn't say they're _easy_ to lug around. Especially when you're sleep deprived. But they definitely get harder to control when they're mobile."

"So it's going to be hard for you?" Santiago asks. "Jamestown preschool doesn't take them until they're 30 months old."

"Shannon said she'll watch Sweetheart whenever I need her to in exchange for some tobacco. But I think Daryl and I can juggle our schedules to watch her ourselves most of the time. How was your archery lesson with Sarah?"

"Apparently I have a lot to learn. But I think she's starting to like me."

"Well just don't get into any drunken brawls over her," Carol teases. "I'd hate to have to dry you out in a cell."

"I've learned my lesson," Santiago assures her.

"Did you by chance sign a petition for Daryl to be on the ballot?"

Santiago tilts his gray-brown felt hat down slightly to block the sun. "No. I didn't know he was running."

"He's not. He doesn't want to. But _someone_ must have submitted a petition for him."

"Well, he's popular. I'd vote for him. If he were running."

"Would you vote for _me_?" she asks, not really sure what the answer might be.

"The woman who just rummaged through all my personal effects?" Her face must look annoyed or fallen because he hastens, "I'm _joking_. You've taken quickly to your job as deputy. You held your own out there when we found the baby. You're one of the heroes of the mutiny of 7 NE. And the Kingdom people ought to have representation on the Council. You're a big group. It will better assure your total assimilation if one of you has a say. People tend to grumble when they feel disenfranchised."

"Daryl could be their voice."

"If he wanted to, yes," Santiago agrees. "But you said he doesn't want to."

They part ways when they reach the Barron family cabin, Santiago to his rounds and interviews, and Carol to have lunch before doing some work in the gardens.


	101. Chapter 101

When Carol enters the Barron family cabin, she finds Shannon feeding Sweetheart while VanDaryl lies on his back on the rug, curled in sleep beneath the watchful eye of Dog. As her adopted daughter suckles at Shannon's breast, Carol can't help but feel a stab of jealousy. She wishes she could feed the baby herself. Maybe her eyes look green, because Shannon says, "Why don't you whip her up some thin grits for lunch. I haven't given her any solids yet today."

While Carol gets to work over the wood stove, Shannon pops Sweetheart off her breast, burps her, and then sets her down on her tummy next to VanDaryl. The baby girl pushes up on all fours and rocks, but doesn't go anywhere. Shannon buttons up the top of her dress. "Is Daryl coming home for lunch?"

"I doubt it. He's pretty focused on the cabin. He'll probably just eat some nuts and jerky."

"Same thing with Garland. He's busy preparing for the election debate."

Carol looks up from the wood stove she's just lit. "There's a _debate_?"

"Tomorrow evening," Shannon tells here. "In the theater."

"Is the theater big enough?" They have to ration seats for the movie showings, after all, by charging something.

"Well, people aren't all that politically invested, to be honest," Shannon replies. "At least, they aren't invested enough to _inform_ themselves. Only about forty-five people showed up to watch the debates last year. The theater holds fifty. If there's more than that, people can stand in the back or on the sides."

A nervous tingle flutters in Carol's stomach. "And what's the format for these debates?"

"The audience gets to ask the questions. You have about a hot minute to answer. Sheriff Earl moderates."

Carol takes the canister of grits down from the hutch. "Is that fair that he's the moderator? His wife is running. And three of his deputies." Including Carol herself.

"Oh, did Ana throw her name back in?"

"Yes. And Commander Lawson is also running. And someone threw Daryl's name in, too. Do you know anything about that?"

Shannon laughs. "No. What did he say when he found out?"

"He said he's striking his name from the ballot." Carol pours the grits into the boiling water. "I guess I better prepare for these debates, too. Though I don't even know _how_ to prepare."

Shannon waves her hand dismissively. "Oh, don't worry about it. You'll be fine. But you know Garland. He doesn't like talking in front of big groups of people, so he's got to go over what he's going to say in his head again and again. He prepares for _every_ possible question he thinks someone might ask. If he gets one he didn't prepare for, watch him. He'll go white as a sheet for just a second before he answers. But I'll stop by his office and give him a quality blowjob a couple hours before the debate starts, and he'll do fine."

Carol laughs. Sweetheart squeals, rocks, and seems like she's about to launch forward into a crawl, but instead she topples over and hits her chin against the rug. She let's out a frustrated wail, and Dog yaps and licks her head.

[*]

By the time Daryl finishes chinking and sanding some of the logs, his stomach is growling. "Time is it?" he asks a farmer passing through the settlement with a bucket of slop for the pigs.

The farmer fishes into the front pocket of his overalls and pulls out a pocket watch. "Two."

Daryl mutters a thanks, drains his canteen, and decides he'll grab a bowl of soup at the tavern. Carol probably cooked and ate lunch over an hour ago.

The tavern is getting ready to close between lunch and dinner when he arrives. Garland is there, however, sitting alone at a two-person table, nursing a beer, and scribbling on a pad.

"Any soup left?" Daryl calls to Madam Linda, who's wiping down the bar. The waitresses have either gone back behind their curtained rooms in the loft or are out and about in the town.

"We're closed," she says.

Daryl nods to Garland.

"Well, I don't ever kick the _mayor_ out," she says.

Daryl's stomach growls audibly.

"You know what?" Madam Linda tells him. "Sit down. I can scrape the edges of the pot for you. But can you shut the shutters and turn the sign to closed first?"

Daryl does, and when he turns around, Garland is looking up. The mayor gestures to the empty chair across from him, and Daryl takes it. "Don't tell Shannon I wasted any of our ammo on beer," he whispers.

"She don't care 'bout that, does she?"

"She doesn't like me drinking because _she_ can't drink with all the nursing she has to do. And I should really be trading the ammo for food so we can both work less." He lifts his pint and takes a small sip. "But I needed a little something to calm my nerves." He gestures to his notes. "The election debate's tomorrow."

"Debate?" Carol hasn't mentioned any debate. "When?"

"Six. In the evening. In the theater."

"Damn," Daryl mutters. He was planning to hunt in the late afternoon tomorrow, but Carol will probably want him at the debate. He'll have to rework the schedule with Mitch. Sometimes it's a pain in the ass being married. He can't just consult his own schedule anymore. And what about Sweetheart? Shannon's probably going to want to be at the debate for Garland. He can bring her, he supposes. Stand in the back and bounce her on his hip. Hell, it'll be a chance to show off his baby girl a little bit.

"I saw your name on the ballot," Garland says. "You never mentioned you were planning to run."

"Someone put me in. Ain't runnin'. Gonna put a line through it."

Garland chuckles. "Hunter _and legend._ I did wonder when I saw that. I also thought to myself - when Carol sees you're running without having said anything…you aren't getting laid for a _month_."

"We got that cleared up."

Madam Linda sets a bowl of soup in front of Daryl. "It's not quite full, so just two rounds will do. Or a pinch of tobacco."

"Aw. Shit. Wasn't thinkin'. Ain't got none of that on me."

Garland starts fishing out his spare magazine when Madam Linda says, "Don't worry about it. Daryl can settle up tomorrow." She turns to Daryl with a raised eyebrow. "Just make sure you do or I'll have to sic Deputy Dixon on you."

Daryl slurps a spoonful of his soup when she's gone. It's lukewarm because the fire has gone out, but he doesn't care. He's ravenous. "Gonna be outta yer hair in three weeks," he murmurs between bites.

"That soon?" Garland asks. "The cabin's that close to done?"

"Yeah. Just gotta do the roof. Shutters 'n door. Lay the floor. Install the wood stove. Then Carol's gonna do whatever. Arrange furniture. Put up room dividers. Curtains or some shit."

"Can't say I won't miss having another man around."

"Ya got two boys. 'M the one's gonna be in cabin full of girls."

Garland smiles. "Well, if you want, I can send over the boys twice a month for a sleepover."

"Pfft."

"Seriously, though, we ought to. Switch out, I mean. Twice a month you send Sweetheart to us. Twice a month we send the boys to you. That way, you and I…we get a little…you know… _time alone_ with our wives."

"Mhmmm…" Daryl murmurs. "Yeah. Good idea."

"Daryl Dixon, hunter, _legend_ , and babysitting co-op member."

"Stahp."

Garland's chest shakes with his swallowed laughter.

"Who ya think put me on the damn ballot?"

"Oh, that was Candy," Madam Linda calls from her stool at the edge of the bar. Daryl forgot about her superpower hearing.

"Hell for?" Daryl asks.

"Well, let's just say the men were buying her a lot of drinks last Saturday while she was waitressing," Madam Linda replies." She got a little drunk and got a notion in her head that you had to be on that Council. She just got a bunch of men who were hanging out and drinking to sign. I bet half of them don't even remember signing it. Captain Cummins declined, though. He seemed concerned about the potential competition if you ran."

"But he wanted Ana on the ballot?" Garland asks.

Madam Linda shrugs. "I guess he doesn't see the women as competition. A lot of people think this town will only pick two women maximum. _Which_ two is the question. Maybe he did it to knock Carol out."

"Hell's he got 'gainst Carol?" Daryl barks. Captain Cummins has always been polite to Carol, after all, if not downright flirtatious, and he seemed to support her trade route idea, even to the point of helping her map it out.

"He thinks she hasn't been in Jamestown long enough to serve on the Council," Madam Linda answers.

"That guy's slicker n' owl shit," Daryl mutters to Garland.

"Yes, but once you realize that, you can work with him," Garland replies.

"Ya've known this whole time what he's like?" Daryl asks.

"He's a closet womanizer and he cheats at poker. But he can steer a ship like nobody's business, and he controls his sailors well. They keep their noses clean and stay out of the drunk tank in a way they never did under the last captain. I just don't want David to be _mayor_ , which is the main reason I'm going to throw my hat in the ring for that position yet again. I'd like to retire already, but if it's not _me_ …it will almost certainly be _him_. If I get re-elected, after I serve out this next year, maybe someone else will be ready to challenge him next tme around."

"Who?" Daryl asks.

Garland shrugs. "Perhaps Daryl Dixon, hunter _and legend_."

Daryl gives him the middle finger, and Garland smirks.

The saloon doors creak open and, without even looking, Madam Linda says, "We're closed."

Gunther Hamilton ignores the warning and walks in with a bouquet of wildflowers at his side. He takes off his straw farmer's hat before he sets the flowers on the bar beside her.

She looks at them suspiciously. "What are those for?"

"I thought you liked purple flowers," he says in his slow southern drawl.

"And I thought you liked younger women."

"A thank you would be nice."

"Thank you." She grabs the bunch and disappears behind the bar to set them in a pint glass full of water. "I take it you want to give me some planted questions to ask at the debate." She clunks the pint glass onto the bar.

Gunther slides onto a stool. "Now why do you assume I have ulterior motives? I saw the flowers, and I thought of you. You mentioned purple was your favorite color."

"Just tell me what the questions are, handsome, and I'll ask them. But then you have to take me on a picnic next Saturday."

Gunther leans forward on the bar and smiles. "Well, now, it sounds like I'm getting the better end of this deal by far. I get your assistance _and_ then I get your company, too?"

Madam Linda snorts. "You _can_ be a charmer when you want to be." She shakes her head. "I'll draw you a pint and then we can go over your questions."

Daryl looks away from the couple and leans forward a bit in his chair. "That cheatin'? Plantin' questions?"

"Oh, no, everyone does it," Garland replies. "It's obvious when it happens, and it's expected. You better find out what Carol wants _you_ to ask."

[*]

When Carol gets back from doing two hours of gardening to help out the Barrons with the extra hours they need to pay for Gary's preschool and rations, Daryl is sitting on the floor against the couch with Sweetheart between his legs, his hands over hers. He claps her hands together and says, "Yaaay!" Then he lets go of her hands and she claps them herself. "Yaaaay!" he cheers softly. "Clap! Clap! Clap!" Sweetheart smacks her hands together three more times and squeals. Daryl looks up when the door closes. "Think she might be a genius," he tells Carol. "That's advanced."

"Clapping? No, Pookie, I don't think so."

He nods to a thick paperback book on the end table. "Book says they _can_ do it at six months, but they _don't_ usually 'til eight or nine. 'N she's only what, seven?"

Carol slides into the armchair and picks up the book – _What to Expect the First Year._ "Where'd you find this?"

"Garland gave it to me. Found it in some house the year Gary was born."

Carol's glad Daryl has a role model for fatherhood, since it can't be his own father. She sets the book down. "Where are the Barrons?"

"Garland went back to his office," Daryl says, "'N Shannon's nappin' with the baby. Gary's still at school." He claps Sweetheart's hands together again. "Yaaaay!" He let's go, but instead of clapping this time, she slaps her hands on the floor, first one, then the other. Then she gets up on her knees to rock. "Book says they crawl 'tween six and ten months. Bet she's gonna crawl soon." He puts a finger on her back as if to give her a little push. "Crawl," he demands.

Carol smiles. "Don't expect too much of her. There's a wide range of normal, and we should just be happy if she's on schedule, given how much she was malnourished for a while. I think I should sit down with Sherry and get a family history, as much as she can tell me about the parents, anyway. Health stuff."

"Hell's Sherry gonna know? Ain't like I ever knew if Rick had high blood pressure."

"Well, I think we _all_ knew Rick had high blood pressure."

"Pffft. Listen. Don't need no damn health history. We're gonna teach 'er to hunt. Trap. Shoot a gun n' a bow. Fight 'n kill. 'N that's _how_ she's gonna live a long life."

"We are going to teach her all those things," Carol agrees, "but we aren't just surviving anymore, Daryl. We're _building_ now. She's maybe going to have to learn less of that stuff than we have and more of some other things."

"What other things?"

"I don't know. Engineering? Plumbing? Architecture? Irrigation? Chemistry? Maybe she'll want to be a teacher or a doctor or a pharmacist or a carpenter. Who knows. In the world we're building, maybe she'll want to be an artist."

"Hell no! Ain't no daughter of mine gonna be some damn _artist_."

"Well, I don't mean full-time. I just mean she's going to have a chance to more fully pursue things we haven't had a chance to pursue in years. Did you know all the school children are putting on a fall musical?"

"Oh, God, ya ain't gonna make me go see that are ya?" he asks.

"Well, the preschoolers have a part, too. Gary's going to sing one song with his group."

"Can I leave after his song?" Daryl asks hopefully.

Carol chuckles. "I guess. But what if your daughter has eight songs when she's in the fall musical?"

Daryl sighs. "Didn't know I was gonna have to sit through dumb shit."

"Sitting through dumb shit is thirty percent of being a parent," Carol tells him. "Not that Ed ever came to any Sophia's ballet recitals."

"Yeah, well…I ain't Ed. Be there. Can't promise'll stay _awake_ , but I'll be there."

"I know you will."

Sweetheart sits back on her bottom again and points to Dog. "Bbbuh bbuh buuhaaaffffft."

"Hear that?" Daryl asks. "Think she just said Dog."

"That was _nothing_ like dog."

"Well maybe she's namin' 'em."

"Naming him what?"

"Bubba."

"Is that what you're gonna call him from now on? Bubba."

"Hey, Bubba!" Daryl shouts to the dog. Dog narrows his eyes and whines. "Guess not."

Carol picks up the book on the end stand and turns it over. She remembers this book. She had _What to Expect When You're Expecting_ , too. She got both at a baby shower at her church, before Ed stopped making them go to church. "When are you leaving to hunt?"

"Right after dinner. Hey, ya don't want me to ask no planted questions, do ya? At the debate tommoruh?"

"What?"

"Guess it's somethin' people do. Ya have someone ask a question ya already know how ya wanna answer."

"No. I think I'll just answer whatever questions anyone asks me. I don't really know how this thing's going to work."

"Ya nervous?"

Carol sets the book down again. "A little," she admits. "Ezekiel did most of the talking when we were both in charge of the Kingdom. And after he died, Jerry was my mouthpiece. I'm not much for speechmaking."

"Nah, but ya ain't much for keepin' yer opion to yerself neither."

Carol rolls her eyes, and Daryl smirks. Then he scrunches up his nose suddenly. "Think ya need to change 'er diaper."

Carol stands. "I think I need to start fixing dinner for everyone. I think _you_ need to change her diaper."


	102. Chapter 102

The babies have just been settled in their cribs in the living room when there's a rapping at the front door. Carol, who is closer to the door than Shannon, lunges for it before the noise can wake the infants. "Shhh," she hisses after opening the door. "Babies."

"Sorry," Santiago whispers back. "You want to talk outside so we don't wake them? Sherriff's department business."

Carol nods and follows him outside, where the sound of porch music and children playing drifts through the settlement. Flickering tiki torches rooted in the earth and oil lamps sitting on wooden outdoor tables besides rocking chairs light the early night. Gary runs around with a five-year-old friend, under the watchful eye of Garland, catching fireflies in a mason jar.

Carol follows Santiago to a bench and sits down beside him. "Well, I cracked the case of the missing box of .223."

"You did?" she asks.

"Want to take a guess?"

"I felt pretty certain it wasn't Paul when I talked to him."

"It wasn't Paul," Santiago agrees.

"Do?."

"Not Don."

"Then it must have been Drake?"

"Not Drake."

"I can't believe Carter would take it and then report it missing. I've known Carter – "

"- It wasn't Carter," Santiago assures her. "At least not _that_ Carter."

"What?"

"It was Sheriff Earl Carter."

"The sheriff?" Carol asks in disbelief.

"He didn't _steal_ it. He just forgot to sign it out. He has the extra set of keys, so he popped in to take it for next weeks' deputy range day with the AR-15s. The training time and ammo was already approved by the Council last month. He just forgot to make a note in the inventory."

"Unbelievable," Carol mutters. "And we were running around interviewing everyone. Wait. We get a range training day with an entire box of .223?"

"Ten rounds per deputy. It's a friendly competition, these quarterly trainings. Care to make a gentleman's wager?"

"Well, she'd have to find a gentleman first," comes Sarah's voice from behind them. Carol turns to see the former knight standing behind the bench with a hand on her hip.

"What brings you slumming to the fort tonight?" Santiago asks her.

"I was looking for you, actually. You told me that when you and Raul were out scavenging, you found a wind-up record player? I was wondering if you might be willing to trade for it for several rounds of ammo. I mostly use arrows anyway."

Santiago stands, smiling. "I should probably confess at this point that it's a Fischer Price record player and the records each only play one song. I hope you like Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."

"Damn you," Sarah mutters.

Santiago's smile grows. "But since you've walked all this way from the museum, why don't we head on to the Tavern and get a drink?"

"Only if you're buying."

As Santiago falls in step beside her, he says, "I wonder if they'll take Mary Had a Little Lamb for a pint?"

[*]

Carol wakes up when the bed creaks and Daryl tosses an arm around her. She has no idea what time it is, but the room is pitch black except for a smattering of starlight seeping through the half-opened shutters. She woke up an hour ago and pumped the chain to get the manual fan going again after it petered out, and her tank top is pressed to her flesh from a light sweat as she lies beneath a single, thin sheet.

Carol puts a hand on his arm and thinks he's freshly showered because his flesh feels slightly damp, but then she inhales the scent of creek water and dry forest leaves. His hands smell of lime soap – he's clearly washed those – but the rest of him has a more natural scent. "Did you fall in?" she asks.

"Sorta."

"Did you get your beaver?"

He nuzzles her neck with his nose and murmurs, "Remains to be seen."

"Oh no," she groans. "I'm so tired. And I have to work in the morning and then prepare for that debate in the evening. I'm so wound up about that."

"Sex'll help ya relax."

"I just want to go back to sleep for the next hour or two or whatever time I've got left."

A disappointed sound reverberates somewhere in his throat.

"Sorry, Pookie." She shifts back against him and realizes he's stark naked atop the sheet. And hard. "What got you going?" she asks. "Did you find a bunch of _Playboys_ jammed in a hollowed-out log by the creek?"

"How ya know where boys used to hide their girly mags?"

She chuckles.

"Nah. Didn't find nothin'. Was just thinkin' 'bout m'wife on the walk home. How goddamn gorgeous she is."

Carol smiles. Did Daryl Dixon really just attempt to use a _line_? She rolls over onto her back. "Well now I'm awake."

"Mhm. Me, too." He tugs the sheet down to her waist and begins to inch her tank top up above her bare breasts. "Might as well hunt beaver." He nips at her neck and fondles first one breast and then the other with one calloused hand as he trails kisses down across her bare flesh. She squirms beneath the tender assault of his mouth and hooks a finger in either side of her panties to ease them down for him.

[*]

Carol's tired when she awakes an hour later to the sunlight dancing across the bed. She closes the shutters all the way to mute the light, and dresses in the dusky haze. Daryl is naked as a jaybird, above the sheets, on his back, and sprawled out over one of the pushed-together beds and half the other. He doesn't wake as she pulls up the zipper on her pants and buttons them. Little noises used to send him lunging for his knife or crossbow, but these days he's more settled, as if his sleeping mind instinctively knows when he's safe and when he's not. When she clicks her handgun into her holster, however, he snorts slightly and rolls over on his side, giving her a good view of his ass. She admires him while she finishes putting on her knife, and then bends down to kiss his cheek.

"Not now," he murmurs, and she chuckles.

"You're coming to the debates tonight?" she asks.

"'Course."

"You don't have to hunt?"

"Just hunt double tommoruh. Gonna sleep 'til noon today, 'n work on the cabin."

"Good." She kisses him again before easing from the room.

Sweetheart is quietly sitting up in her crib in the living room, playing with a chain of plastic rings Daryl clipped to the rail. She squeals when she sees Carol, who goes and plucks her up. VanDaryl is not in his crib, and Carol assumes Shannon took him to bed to feed him and fell asleep with him there.

Carol cherishes her quiet time alone with her daughter. She gives her a drink of water from a bottle and feeds her four tiny spoonfuls of grits thinned by the two ounces of breast milk Shannon left in the cooler. She reads to her from a board book Daryl picked up at the library and the museum, and is sitting with her when Garland emerges with VanDaryl squirming in his arms.

"Morning, Carol." The mayor eases the bedroom door shut gently behind him. His brown hair is ruffled all about his head. "I suppose we're the early risers in this household."

"Today, anyway. Not most days, I suspect."

"No," he agrees. He sits down on the couch next to Sweetheart, who is sitting next to Carol, her legs bent and drawn half together, and her back straight, as if she's trying to look like a tiny adult.

Sweetheart holds out her arms to the infant, and VanDaryl seems to be blinking her into focus. "Mmm baaabaabbaaa mmmm eee!" Sweetheart babbles and squeals.

"You want to hold your cousin?" Garland asks her skeptically.

Carol smiles at the use of the family term. They do feel like family now, but one day, perhaps, Sweetheart is _not_ going to want to think of Gary or VanDaryl as her _cousins_.

Carol tries to imagine that future, sixteen or seventeen years from now…she'll be closer to seventy than to sixty then, if she still stands, if Jamestown still stands. But she _can_ see _it_ \- herself still standing, and Daryl beside her, with a grizzled, gray beard, and the town all around them, grown and still growing. She can _see_ it, and it's the farthest she's ever dared to let herself imagine.

[*]

Carol checks in with Earl at the jail cell before starting her rounds. There's a man in the drunk tank, lying on a matt on the cell floor, snoring. "In the future, before you start an investigation," the sheriff tells her, "please check with me first."

She wants to say something snide about him forgetting to make a note in inventory, but instead she simply says, "Yes, sir."

"We don't need to go around accusing people of things they didn't do."

"No one was _accused_ of anything."

He hands her a notebook. "Deputy Andrew recorded some noise complaints on his early morning rounds. Loud carrying on on the docks. It kept some people awake in the museum last night. The details are in there. I need you to let the officers know that if it happens again, there _will_ be fines. Not just for the sailors, but for them, too, for not keeping it under control."

Carol nods and takes the notebook. On her way to the docks, she passes the cabin-in-progress. Daryl has draped a tarp over the unfinished roof in case of rain. Two beaver pelts are now tacked to either side of the open door frame. She hopes he's just done that to give them a place to dry out, and that he doesn't intend that for _decoration_. She supposes he'll trade the hides, which he gets to keep as a perk of hunting (though he has to hand over all the meat). Or maybe he'll make her a beaver hat for next Christmas.

The first people she finds on the docks are the young sailor Harry and Commander Lawson, talking before one of the ships that is preparing to set out. The captain is on deck consulting a navigation map. "Hello, gentlemen."

"If this is about the noise last night," Commander Lawrence tells her, "the captain and I have already ripped the boys a new one. It won't happen again."

"I have to tell you, if it does – "

"- Fines, yes," the commander interrupts. "Those who were culpable _are_ aware."

"There will be fines for the officers, too," she clarifies, "for not putting a cap on it sooner."

The Commander looks her over coolly. "You've been in Jamestown less than four months and you think you have the authority to assign fines to the _officers_?"

Apparently Carol's display in the New Jamestown museum has not impressed the commander. "The court would assign them of course," she replies thinly. " _Sheriff_ Earl asked me to pass along the message. I'm sure he's been here at least as long as you have."

A puff of air comes out of the commander's nose before he silently boards the ship, where he goes to the deck to talk to Captain Cummins. The captain looks down at Carol on the dock and then back at the commander, says something, and then looks over at the docks again. "Good morning, Carol!" he calls down jovially. Carol, wondering if he's defending her to the commander or just being his usual smooth self by playing the charmer to all, waves up to him.

Harry smiles apologetically. "The commander's not a big fan of refugees," he tells Carol. "He thinks no one from the Kingdom should have been permitted to be deputies or serve on the Council for at least a year after arrival. _And_ he thinks we should have a moratorium on taking people in going forward."

"Lieutenant Witherspoon told me. I suppose he's running on an anti-immigration platform for Council."

"Something like that. Listen, thanks for stopping by to visit with my grandmother the other day. She actually remembered it! Of course, she thought you were my aunt, but…" Harry shrugs.

"She's a lovely lady. It's good of you to look out for her."

Lieutenant Witherspoon strolls toward them, and Harry stands a little straighter. "Good morning, lieutenant."

"Morning, Harry. At ease."

Harry relaxes and smiles knowingly. "Where have you been so early in the morning?"

The young lieutenant flushes slightly. "Just out for a walk."

"About the same time Mitch and Daryl got back from their hunt?" Harry sounds more like a teasing friend than a subordinate.

The lieutenant abruptly turns from the sailor to Carol. "Good morning, deputy."

"Good morning."

"Ready for the debates?" the lieutenant asks.

"Ready as I'll ever be. Which isn't very," she admits.

"Well, good luck to you."

Carol wishes him good luck as well and patrols on. As she glances over her shoulder at Harry and the lieutenant in hushed conversation, she puts the pieces of the puzzle together. Lieutenant Witherspoon, she's pretty sure now, is Mitch's "sailor," and not Harry as she had once believed. But Harry _knows_ about the relationship and has been giving them _both_ a hard time.

A mudslinging politician might make use of all these secret affairs, but Carol's not that. They do make her wonder, however, if anyone else who is running for council has secrets they would prefer to hide from the voting public.

Once in the museum, she stops to view the ballot once again. Daryl's name has been crossed out with lead pencil, repeatedly, until nothing is legible beneath the thick gray lines.


	103. Chapter 103

When Carol arrives in the theater for the debates, at the time she was told the candidates should report, the other twelve candidates are already there, standing loosely in a semi-circle around Sheriff Earl and chatting casually. She's not late. She's ten minutes early, but she's the last one. She hastens down the aisle to meet them. Garland nods a friendly greeting. He's dressed in the nice clothes he always wears for court appearances – the black pants, the white, button-down shirt beneath a black vest, the braided black leather bolo tie, and his black calfskin boots.

In fact, they're _all_ impeccably dressed. Captain Cummins, Commander Lawson, and Lieutenant Witherspoon stand proudly in their dress naval uniforms. Judge Ana Carter and Dr. Carolyn Taylor both wear knee-length black skirts beneath button-down white blouses, while Inloa dons a traditional red and white, ankle-length tear dress she's probably sewn herself. Dr. Ahmad is wearing a long white doctor's coat over a pair of black slacks and has put a red tie on over his white dress shirt. His stethoscope hangs half out of his coat pocket, as if on obvious display. Barry Borowsky's white polo is tucked into a pair of freshly pressed, dark brown Chinos. And even Gunther, whom Carol has never seen outside of rugged jeans or overalls and flannel or canvas shirts, is wearing a pair of gray slacks with a black dress shirt and a black blazer. He must be hot in that. They do have fans to cool the museum, but it's still a good eighty degrees inside. The deputies, Andrew and Thomas, wear pressed brown khakis and short-sleeve navy blue polos. Their deputy stars are pinned in place. Should she have worn her star? She's not on duty.

Carol's not dressed like a slob – she put on her most intact pair of jeans and a draped her open charcoal long-sleeve button-down shirt over her red v-neck, but seeing everyone else, she begins to button up. As she does so, she whispers to Garland, "You didn't tell me the debates were so fancy."

"Sorry," he whispers back. "Didn't even think of it. You look fine."

If Shannon hadn't taken Gary and VanDaryl to visit a friend this afternoon, she might have mentioned something to Carol when she emerged from the bedroom to head to the debates.

"Okay," Earl announces, "for those of you who don't know the drill from last year, you're all going to be sitting on the folding chairs under the screen." There are thirteen, dark brown metal folding chairs lined up at the front of the theater, facing the audience. "I'll tell you what order to file in in a moment. If someone in the audience has a question, they'll raise their hands. I'll call on people. They might address their question to one candidate, or two, or to all the candidates. If the question wasn't addressed to you, don't answer it. If it _was_ addressed to you, stand up when you answer, and sit down when you're done answering. Try to keep your answer to sixty seconds." That seems like a very short amount of time to have to explain anything, Carol thinks. She'll have to think fast and be concise. Daryl might actually do well up here, grunting his yes or no to any question. "If you go on for more than two minutes," the sheriff continues, "I'll cut you off. If you've got something to add to what another candidate said, raise your hand slightly, and I'll call on you, but don't _interrupt_ other candidates."

Carol notices everyone is holding a bottle of water. She didn't think of that – having something to wet her whistle to make sure her voice stays strong. Lieutenant Witherspoon notices her looking around at the bottles and extends her his. "I don't need it."

She shakes her head, but he doesn't stop extending it, so she takes it and thanks him.

Captain Cummins says, "You're looking radiant" to Judge Ana Carter. "How's the pregnancy proceeding?"

Ana puts a hand over her stomach, which is a little plumper but still not showing. "So far so good."

"You can hardly tell you're pregnant," the captain says.

Sheriff Earl looks at the captain warily. "So does _everyone_ know now?"

"I think the cat's well out of the bag, darling," Ana tells him.

Captain Cummins looks directly at Earl. "I'm sure you two will have a beautiful baby. With Ana's eyes if you're lucky."

"Mhmhm. Yes," the sheriff responds. "Let's file in. You first, captain, last chair in the row, far right."

Captain Cummins nods slightly to Earl and goes and sits on the far end of the row beneath the screen. Earl does not send his wife to sit next to the captain. Instead, he sends the lieutenant and then the commander. Next he sends the deputies – Thomas and then Andrew and then Carol. Next to Carol he places Gunther, then Inola, Barry, Dr. Ahmad, Carolyn, Garland, and last of all, at the far end from the captain, Earl seats his wife Ana.

"Is there any logic to this order?" the commander asks. "I mean, I can see we're loosely grouped by profession, but shouldn't _I_ be next to the captain instead of the lieutenant? I'm second in command. The lieutenant is two grades below me."

Lieutenant Witherspoon turns away to hide the instinctive roll of his eyes.

"The order is random," Earl says. "And of no consequence."

Carol wants to ask how long the debate will last, but she doesn't want to sound ignorant. Everyone else was either _in_ the debate last year or _watching_ the debate last year. She's the outsider.

The audience begins to file in, and Carol searches each entering face for Daryl. The seats in the museum theater are long, carpeted benches, arranged in rows of two columns, with an aisle between. Dante takes a seat in the front row immediately opposite Inola and, grinning, gives her two thumbs up. She shakes her head and smiles. Inola's brother Adahy sits next to Dante, and Anika from the Kingdom sits next to him. Carol supposes they're still seeing each other.

Mitch filters in and glances at Lieutenant Witherspoon, who seems to suddenly discover a spot on his boot. The lieutenant bends down to rub it off with his thumb, and Mitch takes a seat somewhere in the middle of the theater, at the opposite end from the lieutenant.

Santiago enters with Sarah and Raul, and the deputy follows Sarah to a seat at the far end of the second to last row. Barry's wife and teenage daughter Rachel come in next, with Rachel's boyfriend Jackson. Rachel goes and sits right next to Raul, who shifts a little closer to his father. Jackson refuses to enter the row after her and gives Raul a glare. Barry's wife waves the girl toward seats in the front, near Barry, and she smiles at Raul, rolls her eyes, and follows her mother's command. Jackson, glowering, follows them both. Raul relaxes.

More people filter into the front rows - Dr. Ahmad's wife Tamara, a woman Carol assumes is Commander Lawson's wife based on where she chooses to sit and the nod they give each other, and Madam Linda and Trisha. (Does that mean Candy alone is manning the Tavern? Carol wonders. Or did they close it?)

People Carol doesn't recognize continue to flow in and take seats, and then a bunch of people she does recognize – her own Kingdom people. Kelly, who was given a bed in the orphanage and the job of keeping an eye on the kids, finds the nearest empty seat, next to Raul, and introduces herself. He hesitantly shakes her outstretched hand. Kelly's only about four years older than Raul, and Carol hopes maybe this will be the beginning of a friendship for them. Raul could use a friend.

Edward, the Kingdom's old plumber, and Jimmy, its former electrician join the audience, as does Emily, who now assists Dr. Ahmad at the clinic. In fact, by the time the seats are full, Carol counts a total of ten faces from the Kingdom, but she's still looking for Daryl's.

A guard who has probably just stepped off duty because his rifle is still slung over his shoulder comes in and leans against the back wall. And then finally Daryl enters, with Shannon. Shannon wears a sleeping Van Daryl in a snugly across her chest, while Daryl sports Sweetheart in a backpack. Sweetheart's not asleep, but squealing, so he shucks the backpack, sets it on the floor, takes her out, and puts her on his hip instead. He fishes in his front shirt pocket and shoves a pacifier in her mouth, which she sucks happily.

Shannon shifts uncomfortably on her feet where she stands with the weight of the baby on her chest. Daryl lightly smacks a man in the back of the head who is sitting near the aisle in the back row, mutters something, and points to Shannon. The man scrambles to his feet to give Shannon his seat and goes and stands against the back wall instead. That was not the most gallant way to be gallant, perhaps, but it makes Carol smile.

"Where's Gary?" Garland calls down the aisle to Shannon.

"I left him at home alone playing with matches!" Shannon calls back. "He's at the Carraway's cabin, of course." The Carraways are a couple with a child just two years older than Gary, and the boys often play together.

The audience chuckles as Garland flushes from his scolding.

Next to Carol, Gunther surreptitiously fishes a small flask out of his blazer pocket and takes a quick sip before returning it. Maybe he's as nervous as she's fast becoming. "It's just water," he whispers when he notices her observing.

"Mhmhm."

"Would someone shut those doors so we can begin?" Earl asks loudly.

The man Daryl booted from his seat shuts the doors and returns to his place along the wall. Daryl probably would have shut them, but he's too busy dealing with a squirming Sweetheart who is trying to free herself from his arms. The baby goes suddenly limp like a protester in the grip of a cop and begins to slide out, so Daryl catches hold of her again, but resigns himself to setting her on the carpeted floor of the theater, just in the aisle at back.

Carol's heart warms to see her daughter there, facing the candidates, on her hands and knees, rocking with a smile spreading out around her pacifier. The nervousness in Carol's muscles begins to dissipate as she smiles at her little cheerleader and Earl announces, "Let the debate begin."


	104. Chapter 104

Over half the hands in the audience go up. These people aren't just here to watch. They have _questions_. Daryl scans the audience. There must be fifty-three people in the theater, not counting the candidates and moderator. Carol looks pretty, he thinks. She's wearing those jeans that fit tightly around her legs and her short hair is feathering just a little in that way he loves for reasons he doesn't understand.

Earl calls on someone by name. The hands go down. The audience member stands. Daryl knows him vaguely. He's one of the guards at the front gate. "This is a question for all of the candidates. If elected to Council, will you put yourself on the ballot for mayor?"

"We'll start at this end," Earl says, pointing to his wife.

Ana stands and says, "If elected to the council, I will decline to run for the position of mayor." She sits.

Garland stands and says, "Yes, and I hope my previous service as mayor, as well my obvious dedication to this community, will inspire the citizens of Jamestown to vote for me for one final term." By the way he projects and holds himself, Daryl would never guess he had a fear of speaking publicly before groups.

The veterinarian stands to say - "I hope to serve you again on the Council, but I will not run for the position of mayor."

Dr. Ahmad rises. "Yes, I will put my name on the ballot for mayor. I have ample administrative experience that I think will help me to fulfill this role well."

Barry, Inola, and Gunther all decline to run. Carol stands next and says, simply, "No" before sitting down. Daryl respects her brevity. Everyone else is a bit of a windbag.

Deputy Andrew and Deputy Thomas both say they won't run, while Commander Lawson answers, "I haven't yet decided. But if the people of Jamestown want me to run, who am I to deny them?"

 _What a putz_ , Daryl thinks.

Captain Cummins stands last. "Yes, I do intend to run for mayor. Mayor Barron has served us well, but a fresh face and a fresh perspective might serve us well, too."

Sweetheart has gotten off her hands and knees, plopped on her bottom, and turned her head to look up at Daryl. He wiggles her fingers at her, and she plucks her pacifier out of her mouth and smiles up at him. She tries to put it back in her mouth but drops it, so he crouches, plucks it up, and shoves it back in her mouth before she can cry about it.

"Ewww," Shannon whispers to him from her seat near the aisle. "Clean it first, Daryl!"

"Little dirt never hurt no one," he mutters back. The door behind him creaks open and Dwight slips in. He catches Daryl's eye but quickly looks away. Dwight moves hastily to the far, side wall and takes up a spot halfway down it. Daryl wonders why Dwight's bothering with the debates. He won't have been here for three months by the election. He doesn't have citizenship rights yet, including the right to vote. But maybe he just wants to get a better idea of this world he's living in now, to make sure there are no Negans running for the Council.

Earl has just called on another audience member. "This question is for Judge Carter and Deputy Dixon," the man says. "How do you plan to juggle motherhood and serving on the Council? I understand you're about to have a baby, judge, and that you've just adopted an infant, deputy. Are you sure you'll be able to dedicate enough time and focus to your council position?"

Daryl sees the pissed-off look that crosses Carol's face. It only lasts a second before she's forced herself to calm again. The man sits down. Earl looks at Ana like maybe they've had this discussion privately a dozen times already. Ana looks a little pissed, too.

The judge stands and says, "Arthur, any particular reason you didn't ask that question of any of the fathers sitting up here? Garland has a baby boy _and_ a preschooler. Barry is also a father. And maybe some other man sitting up here will be a father before the year is up."

Andrew shifts next to Carol and smiles out at his fiancé, the waitress Trisha. _Guess he's knocked her up_ , Daryl thinks. Captain Cummins sits up straighter in his chair. Daryl catches the uncomfortable motion out of the corner of his eye.

"Oh come on now!" another man calls from the audience. "You know it's not the _same_. At the very least y'all are the ones that have to feed them."

"Please," Earl intones, "no comments from the audience unless you are called upon."

Ana, who is still standing, says, "I've given this careful consideration and discussed the matter with my husband. My baby won't be born for another six months. Infants sleep a great deal. Earl can handle the baby during council meetings." She sits down and crosses her legs and her arms.

Carol is more politic when she stands to answer the question. She turns on a bit of her old cookie Carol charm for a moment. "Balancing work and a child can be very challenging," she agrees. "And I understand your concern, Arthur." Daryl wonders if she even knows Arthur or if she's just echoing the name because Ana used it. "Childrearing is a very important and valuable role. Now more than ever, children are our future. Our _only_ future."

Sweetheart, on hearing Carol's voice, throws herself forward on her little hands and pushes up on her knees.

"But it's also important that we have the kind of Council that can help secure that future for our children," Carol continues, "a council made up of fathers _and_ mothers, men _and_ women who will ensure the development and protection of Jamestown. I think I can be one of those people. I raised an adoptive son while co-ruling an entire community, and I think I can manage to raise a baby while serving on Jamestown's council."

Sweetheart beings rock. She puts one hand forward as if attempting to crawl toward the sound of Carol's voice but falls flat on her face instead. Daryl scoops her up before she begins to wail and slides the fallen pacifier back into her mouth.

"I am so blessed to have help in the important work of raising my daughter," Carol continues. "My husband, of course," - heads turn in Daryl's direction for moment. "But also friends. My baby has the best godparents a mother could ask for, and there are others I know who will step up to help in times of need. That's one of the many strengths of Jamestown – this strong community we have, a community I would be honored to serve."

Carol sits back down.

"Yaaay, Mommy!" Daryl whispers to Sweetheart and, supporting her on one bent leg, claps her little hands together. Sweetheart gurgles.

"Next question," the sheriff says, and points to Madam Linda.

She stands and says, "This question is for Assistant Farm Manager Hamilton. As a council member, what kind of policies would you pursue to increase Jamestown's farming output?"

Gunther stands. "Well, I'm glad you asked that, ma'am. I do have a number of ideas for expanding production. We can shift our tobacco growing to private gardens and use that rather fertile field to grow grapes instead. Virginia has always been tobacco country, but …." 

Daryl tunes out the rest of what Gunther says because farming is not his thing and Sweetheart is trying to climb out of his arms again. He bounces her to distract her from her task.

Dante is called on next and poses a question for Inola. "We're starting to run up against a housing shortage in Jamestown. If we take in even one more refugee, I don't think we'll know where to put him. We've got two people living in the laundry room of the museum right now, and that's not an ideal location." Dwight looks in Dante's direction. "We have sixteen men shoved into the barracks, and six women in a single room in the museum, without any real privacy." Two of the Kingdom women who live in that room nod, as do four men who probably live in the barracks. "What solution would you propose to the problem?"

Inola stands. "I would propose that the builders, as part of their twenty-hour work weeks, begin construction of dormitory-style housing consisting of four suites. Each suite would have six bedrooms surrounding a communal living room and kitchen area with a fireplace or wood stove, and each bedroom could house one or two people. This would be a space-saving facility, and the bedrooms would be small, but it would also allow for a certain amount of privacy. Upon its completion, the men in the barracks, the couple in the laundry room, and the women in the museum could move into their _own_ rooms. That would free up the barracks as temporary housing for future refugees, and we could use the room in the museum as a quarantine room in the event we ever have another disease outbreak."

When she sits down, Commander Lawson raises a finger.

"Yes?" Earl says, pointing to him.

He stands up. "Another solution to the problem of the housing shortage would be to decline to take in any additional refugees. Then we can leave everyone where they are, and we wouldn't have to deplete the building materials in the storehouse to build this dormitory, and the workmen can put their labor – for which they get paid rations I might remind you - to better use on projects that would benefit the _entire_ community and not just a select few people who want room upgrades."

"May I rebut?" Inola asks.

"Sixty seconds." Earl gestures for her to stand up.

"The workmen have finished the gristmill," Inola says when she stands. "They've finished the fences and watch stands. Finished the stone walkways. We need to continue to make regular repairs, but the workmen have no other major building projects right now. And they need to work their twenty hours. It wouldn't be a waste of their labor. It would create a better living environment for twenty-six _existing_ members of our community, and it would allow us to have a quarantine room right next to the infirmary if ever needed. Even if we _were_ to stop taking in refugees – and I'm certainly not saying I agree we should – our community will grow through birth over time, and we're going to need the housing eventually."

Deputy Thomas raises a finger. "May I add something?" Earl nods, and he stands. "What about the people who already had to pay for their own housing supplies to build their own places? They didn't get any free upgrades at community expense. When I built my cabin, I had to pay workmen for their labor and trade for the supplies."

 _Damn right_ , Daryl thinks instinctively. But he also thinks Inola has a good idea, and he doesn't really care if he had to work for his place while others don't. It will be their own home, not some shared dormitory. And he _wanted_ to build it for Carol.

"Inola?" Earl ask.

"No one has ever been required to build his own cabin or hut," she says after standing. "Some have _chosen_ to because they didn't want to live in crowded conditions. But many took the huts and cabins or ship cabins "that were original to the settlement and village. They were _given_ housing. And some were given better housing than others. Some were upgraded from the barracks after the mutiny and given an entire cabin on a ship." She looks at the commander pointedly. "Some were given the barracks and chose to build better for themselves." She looks at Thomas.

Carol raises a finger and Earl calls on her. She stands and suggests, "If it would cause people discontent to allow these upgrades entirely at community expense, perhaps we can charge a nominal rent for the dormitory rooms – say, a little bit of tobacco or a little ammunition to be returned to the communal storehouse each month, or maybe one extra hour of labor each week. The Council could work out a small rent, and that would also help to ration the rooms to the people who most value them."

Earl calls on Trisha in the audience next, and she says, "My question's for Deputy Andrew. Deputy, do you have any ideas for scavenging more supplies for Jamestown?"

Deputy Andrew stand up. "As a matter of fact I do…"

Daryl sees what Garland means about the planted questions being the norm now. He watches planted question after planted question being asked, and the rehearsed answers being returned. An hour has passed. VanDaryl has awakened and is nursing at Shannon's breast beneath a blanket. Meanwhile Sweetheart has fallen asleep snuggled against Daryl's shoulder. And in all this time _no one_ has asked Carol a _single_ question. She's not getting _any_ time to talk. She's only answered three questions this whole damn debate.

Daryl shifts Sweetheart into a one-armed cradle position so he can free one hand to raise it. He has to raise it two more times before Earl finally calls on him, and when Earl does, he panics. He doesn't know what he should ask. "Uh…this un's for Carol. Deputy Dixon, I mean."

"Yes, carry on," the sheriff tells him.

"Deputy Dixon, ya…uh…ya got ideas?"

Carol gives him that all too familiar sympathetic pout she shoots him when she finds him adorably inept. But she makes the most of the question when she stands. "I have some ideas for expanding our prosperity and human connections by establishing a trade route along the James River and using an oceanside location as a trading hub for Jamestown and three friendly communities with which I already have connections. The next generation will be rebuilding this world," Carol continues, "and the bigger we can make their world, the more allies we can give them, the more hope they will have of rebuilding it."

Carol uses up all her sixty seconds and then some before she's finally cut off by Earl and sits down. But there's some murmuring in the audience, as though maybe not everyone has heard rumors of this possible plan, and they're excited about the prospect of interacting with other civilized people.

Sweetheart awakens in her new position and begins to fuss, and feeling like he's done his part, Daryl slips from the theater to pace with her in the foyer of the old museum.


	105. Chapter 105

Daryl drops the rope of the drag sled holding the black bear he and Mitch fished out of their bear pit. He looks up at the shifting sun. "Time is it?"

He never cared what time it was before Jamestown. It was enough for him to estimate the general part of the day through the position of the sun. He lived a life without deadlines or dinner times or schedules. But here, everyone seems to have a wind-up pocket watch.

"5:30," Mitch replies before slipping his silver watch back into his pants. The chain hangs loosely out of the pocket. "Why?"

"When the poll's close?"

Carol's been campaigning like a madwoman all week long since the debates. She's been taking evening walks and just talking to people about what they love about Jamestown and what they don't love about it – what they want to see changed. She knows the names of almost everyone now. It's hard to imagine she once lived in that little house outside the Kingdom, refusing to talk to anyone, growling at visitors. She even knows the names of half the kids. Kids can't vote, but Carol says parents like it when you know their kids' names.

"6:00," Mitch answers. "Haven't you voted yet? The polls opened at noon. I voted before we left."

"Thought there'd be time after we went huntin'."

"Well there's not going to be time," Mitch says incredulously. "Carol is going to _crucify_ you if she finds out you didn't vote."

"Got to get this bear back yerself." Daryl shrugs out of his backpack and leaves it on the ground. "Take m' pack, too." Lightened from the load, with nothing but his crossbow on his back now, he takes off running.

Dog barks and bounds after him, while Mitch's holler of "I can't carry all this shit alone!" fades behind him.

Mitch is right. Carol will crucify him if he doesn't make it back in time. He plunges into the shallow part of a creek. His boots smacks against the rocks beneath and his ankle nearly twists. He stumbles forward on his hands, pushes up, and runs to the other side. Dog, barking, follows, the water spraying up above his head as his paws smack through the creek.

Daryl scrambles up a hill on the opposite bank and keeps running. If Garland thought he wasn't getting laid for a month when his name showed up on that ballot…well, he's not getting laid for a _year_ if he doesn't make it to those polls.

A lone walker rustles from between two trees. Normally he'd stop to kill it for the practice – he doesn't get but one or two chances a week to kill a walker these days – but there's no time to pause for that. He just turns his body sharply and dodges it. Dog pauses only to growl a warning at the decaying monster and then follows his best friend.

Daryl takes a shortcut back to Jamestown, which puts him at the front gate by what he _hopes_ is 5:50. "Open! Open!" he shouts, and the guards frantically do, asking him what's wrong, spilling out of the gates, guns ready, looking for whatever's pursuing him, only to state in puzzlement at each other when they find nothing and Daryl just keeps running on into the museum.

By the time he reaches the polling location in the council chambers, he's slick with sweat and breathing heavily. There are two people inside – someone Daryl recognizes as a guard and that old woman who works as the court reporter – Maude, Daryl wants to call her – but he's not sure that's right, so he doesn't say her name. "Need to vote!" he gasps between raspy breaths, and, behind him, Dog sits down on his haunches and licks his chops.

The guard is folding up the cardboard dividers they set up to make individual voting booth on the long card table where the Council usually sits. His hand pauses on the fifth and last divider.

"The poll's close at six," the court reporter answers. "It was posted."

"Time is it?" Daryl breathes.

"Five after."

"Ma'am, been huntin'. Got here fast as I could. _Please_."

She looks him over. "You're Daryl Dixon, aren't you?"

Daryl's never been one to use his legendary status to get things from people before, but…"Yeah. Yeah. 'M _that_ guy."

She smiles and hands him a paper ballot, and the guard takes his hand off the last divider and steps aside. As Daryl heads for the booth, the woman says, "Let me give you the voting instructions."

"Know how to fill out a damn ballot." The grumbling response is purely instinctive, and he immediately wishes he hadn't said it. He turns to find her frowning. "Sorry. 'S the instructions?"

"It's multi-winner ranked choice voting," she tells him coolly.

"What?" The truth is, he's never filled out a ballot before in his life. He's never been to any poll. He never liked anyone who ever ran for President of the United States in his lifetime – they were all a bunch of slimy assholes as far as he was concerned, and his life was going to go on just the same regardless of who was sitting behind the desk in some white marbled oval. He never gave a shit who his Congressman was, either, because whoever the hell he was, it wasn't like he was going to represent _Daryl_. He didn't even vote in his high school class elections, mostly because he'd either skipped that day or he was out back smoking. He didn't know any of those kids anyway. But he always figured voting was easy. You just checked off the box beside the person you wanted, right? "Hell's ranked choice voting?"

"Just number your choices in order of preference on the line next to each name, one through thirteen. One being your first choice for council, and thirteen being your last."

Well, shit, he didn't know he was going to have to _rank_ people. "A'ight," he mutters as he walks to the booth, puts the ballot down, and picks up the freshly sharpened lead pencil lying on the table. The guard walks further away to give him his privacy.

Daryl immediately writes a 1 next to Carol's name, and then a 2 next to Garland's. That part was easy enough. What the hell does he do now? He skims the ballot again:

 **_2_ Mayor Garland Barron (I)  
_ Captain David Cummins (I)**

 **_ Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad (I)  
_ Commander Jeffrey Lawson **  
**_ Lieutenant James Witherspoon  
_ Inola Chotka  
_ Judge Anna Carter (I)**  
 **_ Barry Borowsky (I)  
_ Dr. Carolyn Taylor (I)  
_ Gunther Hamilton** **_  
_**_1_ Deputy Carol Dixon  
_ Deputy Thomas Mayfield **_  
_**_ Deputy Andrew Davies****

He turns his head back. "Hell's it mean, independent?" There are no political parties in Jamestown, are there? He's never heard of one, anyway.

"The I means incumbent," the court reporter answers. "Current council members." She sounds a bit impatient.

"Oh." He turns back and considers the ballot.

Well, that Commander Jeffrey Lawson guy is a putz, Daryl thinks. He doesn't want to take in anyone new. There was a time when Daryl felt like that himself – after he was nice to Dwight and Dwight killed Denise. But that time is long gone, and Daryl's the refugee now. It's not like Jamestown doesn't vet people before they take them in. They have a hell of a better system than just asking – "How many walkers have you killed? How many people have you killed?" They keep an eye on their refugees, and they don't give them all the rights of citizenship for three months.

He puts a 13 next to Commander Lawson's name.

What now? He doesn't know anyone else on this ballot personally, except Inola. She's worked with him on the cabin's chimney and the foundation and on that bear pit. She's a competent mason. She had a decent idea about expanding housing. If they build that dormitory, and more folks have some _privacy_ , maybe he won't stumble on people fucking in random spots anymore. He could live without that embarrassment. It only happened the once – some man from the barracks and some Kingdom woman from the shared room in the museum – but once was _enough_. Inola seems intelligent to him. She's kind. And she's pretty. Not that being pretty has shit to do with being a council member, but he's not going to say it doesn't prejudice him further in her favor. He puts a 3 next to her name and scans the ballot again.

Dr. Ahmad saved Carol's life. If not for the doc, Daryl would never have learned what it was like to be inside her while she cried his name. Besides, Dr. Ahmad's an incumbent, and there's something to be said for knowing how things work already. He puts a 4 next to the doctor.

Deputy Thomas also helped save Carol's life. He patched her up in the woods, kept her alive long enough to get her to Jamestown and the doc. If not for Deputy Thomas, Carol would be dead now, and Daryl never would have known what it was like to wake up every single morning to the feel of her soft body curled against his. Daryl doesn't know the man, not really, but he's never heard anyone say anything bad about him either. Thomas is both a medic and a deputy – double skilled. Able to hunt people down _and_ patch them up. Might as well. He puts a 5 in the nearby blank.

He's voted for two deputies. He doesn't need to vote for a third. Besides, he vaguely remembers Andrew leering at his whiskey in Lancelot's saddlepack in the woods and telling Garland, "We're going to have us a good time tonight!" That man took some of his whiskey and traded it for sex with a whore. Probably Trisha. Of course, she's a waitress these days and Andrew's _marrying_ her now. But Daryl needs to rank these people, so he puts a 12 next to Andrew's name.

Barry's served before. He knows how it goes. Daryl doesn't think he's exactly done the best job of raising his daughter – she's a manipulative skank, that girl, trying to pit Jackson against Raul – but Daryl doesn't personally have anything against Barry. Besides, he's a _hunter_. The council should have a hunter. He puts a 6 next to Barry's name.

Who's next? He's not sure about Gunther. He thinks Gunther secretly has a thing for his wife, and he's not too thrilled Carol wants to invite him over for dinner once the cabin is built, either. But Carol's a pretty good judge of character, and she thinks Gunther's competent and has good ideas for expanding Jamestown's food supply. He also supports the trade route to Oceanside. And they really should have a farmer on the council. Gunther's not just a farmer – he's a manager – he knows both ends of it – the laboring and the leading. And even though Daryl's pretty sure he'd be all over Carol like white on rice if she wasn't married, Gunther's never actually made a _move_ on her. He can see the lines, and he doesn't cross them. And he can't really fault a man for liking Carol. She's the best damn woman there is. Daryl writes in a 7 next to Gunther's name.

But you know who can't see the lines? Captain David Cummins. He's fucking some other man's wife. He might be a decent captain and a fine manager of the fishermen, but Daryl's not sure a man can be trusted if he's fucking someone else's wife. Of course, Merle fucked more than a few men's wives, back when they were doing odd jobs on people's houses - bored housewives who wanted a one-time romp with the bad boy. But Merle wasn't exactly trustworthy either, to be honest, not unless you were his only brother, and sometimes not even then. Daryl writes an 11 next to Captain David Cummins.

That leaves the judge, the veterinarian, and the lieutenant. Carol tells him the lieutenant is Mitch's secret sailor. He's not sure what to think of a man who can't just admit who he likes to fuck. Maybe the rest of the Navy men will give him a hard time if he does, but if he doesn't have the backbone to tell those men to go to hell, what _does_ he have the backbone for? On the other hand, people are as gossipy and nosy as hell, and Daryl can understand a man who likes to keep his private life private. Besides, Daryl suppose someone can't come of age in this world and be a pussy. Lieutenant Witherspoon is old enough to remember the old world and what's worth trying to salvage about it – but young enough that he's probably less tied to old ways of thinking that might prevent survival in the world as it exists now. Daryl puts an 8 next to his name.

That just leaves the judge and the veterinarian. Now Carolyn has no problem admitting who she likes to fuck. Everyone knows she's a lesbian. The fact drives the single men crazy. To them it's like going into a poor man's house and setting his last dollar bill on fire. "Couldn't she at least be bisexual?" Daryl heard a man muttering at the Tavern one night. "Couldn't she at least _try_? Ain't like she'll ever have a girlfriend in Jamestown." But with no girlfriend, no boyfriend, and no kids, Carolyn sure does have a lot of time to dedicate to serving Jamestown. And Ana's got that baby coming.

Carol would stare him down with eyes of fire if she heard him thinking that. But he can't help but think it. Shannon didn't run again because of how hard it's been with the baby and working for the extra rations for Gary and still keeping things solid between her and Garland. Ana _almost_ didn't run again because of the pregnancy, though she changed her mind. But Daryl suddenly remembers Carol grumbling that Carolyn wasn't very supportive of her trade route idea when she proposed it at that open town hall. He doesn't know what Ana thought of the idea. In the end, he puts the 9 next to Ana and the 10 next to Carolyn and then looks his ballot over one last time:

 **_2_ Mayor Garland Barron (I)  
_11_ Captain David Cummins (I)**

 **_4_ Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad (I)  
_13_ Commander Jeffrey Lawson **  
**_8_ Lieutenant James Witherspoon  
_3_ Inola Chotka  
_9_ Judge Anna Carter (I)**  
 **_6_ Barry Borowsky (I)  
_10_ Dr. Carolyn Taylor (I)  
_7_ Gunther Hamilton** **_  
_**_1_ Deputy Carol Dixon  
_5_ Deputy Thomas Mayfield **_  
_**_12_ Deputy Andrew Davies****

From behind him comes the long, audible sigh of the court reporter. "'M done!" he assures her. He folds the ballot in thirds, walks it over to the ballot box, and slips it through the slot.

As he walks out of the council chambers, they start packing up. He goes to the breakroom not far from the mayor's office to get a drink of water out of the gravity-well-fed faucet. He tilts his head beneath it and guzzles. Maybe the six women crammed in that room next door won't _want_ to move out into the dormitory when it's built. They've got running water, electricity, and bathrooms in here. Everyone else has to go to the outhouses and draw from wells and light candles and oil lamps.

"There are glasses."

Daryl hits the faucet when he comes up and winces. He turns off the water and turns to see Garland. "Didn't wanna dirty one."

Garland reaches down and scratches Dog behind the ears. The canine has followed Daryl to the breakroom and plopped himself down in the doorway. "Catch anything?"

"Bear."

"Where is it?"

"Shit," he mutters. "Need to go help Mitch." He whistles to dog as walks past Garland in the doorway, and the canine yaps and follows.

Mitch is a quarter mile from the gates when Daryl finds him. Daryl's pack is on top of the dead bear, and so is Mitch's pack. Mitch has a rifle over his left shoulder, and a rope over both shoulders. He's bent forward, pulling. He drops the ropes when he sees Daryl. "You know I almost got killed by a walker back there because I was trying to lug all this stuff and couldn't get to my rifle immediately."

"Sorry," Daryl says. "Should of paused to kill that un."

"Well, I did get a winning lotto ticket off of it. Four cherries. 500 bucks."

Daryl snorts.

"Help me get this bear to the butcher," Mitch tells him, "then come with me to the Tavern and buy me a drink and a bowl of soup, and I'll call it even."

That's a lot of ammo or tobacco he won't have to pay Raul to help him with the shutters and door and floor of the cabin, but at least they're done with laying the roof. Daryl nods his agreement and grabs hold of one of the ropes.


	106. Chapter 106

Later that night in bed, before she's turned down the oil lamp all the way, Carol lifts her pretty blue eyes to Daryl's and asks, "Who did you vote for?"

"Ballot's secret." The results are supposed to be available in the morning, when the polls open again to allow citizens to vote for the mayor.

She smiles. "Did you at least vote for me?"

"Mmmm…. _Maybe_ ," he teases.

"Did you put me or Garland as number one?"

From her tone, that's a serious question, and not a rhetorical one. "Put _you_ of course."

"I put Garland as number one."

""Really?" he asks, slipping a finger beneath one spaghetti strap of the light shirt she's worn to bed.

"He deserves it, don't you think?"

"Well I ain't got to go to bed with Garland."

" _Got_ to go to bed with? Is it a chore, Pookie?" She bats her eyelashes at him.

"Stahp. Knew what I meant."

"Is that why you voted for me?" she teases. "Just to get laid?"

"Don't think yer tradin' sex for votes. Better not be anyhow."

She turns off the oil lamp and then snuggles up against his side. Her fingers curl around the hair on his bare chest. She kisses his shoulder and closes her eyes as if she's going to go to sleep, but she doesn't. Five minutes later she wakes him by saying, "I feel like a kid on Christmas."

"Maybe sex'll help ya sleep."

"I'm too excited for sex."

"Ain't never heard of no one being _too_ excited for sex," he murmurs.

"Not that kind of excited." She slips her hand away. "I think I'm going to get dressed and go for a walk. Get some of this energy out."

"Want me to come?"

"Yes, but I don't need you to. Sleep."

"M'comin'." Daryl slides out of bed.

They check on Sweetheart to make sure she's sound asleep in her crib in the living room. The baby is on her stomach. "Book says they's s'posed to sleep on their backs," Daryl whispers.

"It's fine. I put her to sleep on her back. If she rolled herself over on her stomach, she can roll herself back."

Daryl glances at Van Daryl in the neighboring crib. The smaller infant is wrapped tightly in swaddling blankets and asleep on his back, with just his little head, freckled nose, and a single thin curl of reddish-brown hair sticking out.

A groan drifts out from beneath Shannon and Garland's door, and then Shannon's voice, "You like that, baby?"

"Guess _he_ ain't too excited for sex," Daryl mutters.

"Shannon's giving Garland what he needs to relax," Carol whispers, "and you're giving me what _I_ need." She takes his hand and squeezes it. "Because you're a good husband." She plucks up the oil lamp with her other hand and tugs. "Come on."

When the front door of the cabin softly clicks shut behind them, Daryl thinks that they aren't going to be able to leave the cabin whenever they want once they have their own. They won't be able to rely on the Barrons to get Sweetheart if she wakes up unexpectedly.

Quiet hours have begun, so there's almost no activity outside, except for the distant cluck of chickens. The tiki torches that serve as streetlamps until quiet hours begin have all been put out for the night, but the moon and stars are bright enough that they hardly need the oil lamp Carol holds. Outside the settlement fence, she turns left toward the docks instead of right toward the Indian village. Daryl follows.

They encounter Santiago on patrol on the dirt path just as it ends by the docks. The deputy nods. "Hey, Carol. Daryl. What are you doing out at this hour?"

"Just going for a walk," Carol says. "Nothing suspicious."

Santiago smirks.

"I'm too worked up about the election," Carol admits. "I couldn't sleep."

"You aren't the only one. Gunther and Inola are awake too. But at least they're staying quiet, unlike that ruckus the sailors caused last week."

He walks with them onto the docks. At one of the long picnic tables in the grass across from the _Susan Constant_ , two oil lamps glow. At the table sit Gunther and Dante, almost shoulder to shoulder. Madam Linda and Inola sit across from them. Dante throws a card into a discard pile, and Inola picks one from the draw deck. Daryl wonders why they'd come all the way down here when three of the four live in the Indian Village, but, then again, this is where Carol wandered, too. There's something soothing about the lapping lull of the river against the dock.

"Can't sleep either?" Gunther asks when they near, and Carol shakes her head. "Join us?"

Carol looks at Daryl with a raised eyebrow.

"'S what ya want?" he asks.

"Would you mind?" she whispers.

He shrugs, because it doesn't matter if he minds. It's clear she wants to. She sits down next to Gunther on the bench, so Daryl takes the empty spot across from her next to Madam Linda. Santiago looks longingly at the party but continues his rounds on toward the museum.

Gunther extends a silver flask to Carol, and she shakes her head. "I don't have cooties," he assures her. "And if I did the alcohol would kill them."

Carol smiles. "I probably shouldn't start tonight. I'm too wound up. I might drink it all."

Daryl's not thrilled with Gunther offering his wife – and _only his wife_ – a drink. "Didn't ask me."

Gunther extends him the silver flask across the table, and Daryl takes a big sip. It's not Jamestown shine. It's something better, some kind of brown whiskey. He hisses in surprise as he draws it from his lips. The silver surface of the flask is etched with the letters _GMH_. Daryl wonders what the M stands for. Probably not Merle. But with a redneck name like Gunther, who knows. Maybe it does. "'S the M stand for?" he asks as he returns the flask.

"I don't know," Gunther answers. "It's not mine. I found it a couple of years ago when I was scavenging. I figured it was a lucky coincidence, having my initials and all. Well, except for the M. I don't have a middle name."

"We're playing Rummy 500," Inola tells them. "We'll start a new game and deal you in after this hand."

"I'm about to win anyway," Madam Linda insists.

"She's a card shark that one." Gunther points to her with his flask. "Want another pull?"

Madam Linda reaches across the table for the flask, takes a sip, hands it back, and then lays down three kings and discards a five. "I'm out."

Dante throws his cards on the splintery tabletop. "Good thing we aren't playing for ammo."

Gunther slides all the cards toward himself and begins shuffling.

"We should add another deck if we've got six people," Madam Linda tells him, and she pulls a deck of cards out of a deep pocket in her dark green cargo pants.

"You think I'm going to trust _your_ deck?" Gunther asks with twinkling hazel eyes. He turns to Carol. "She cleaned out half the sailors last night at the Tavern."

"Only _three_ of them," Madam Linda insists. She slides the deck out of the box and pushes it over to Gunther. "Check it if you don't trust me."

He does, paging through the cards while Inola tells Carol, "You did really well at the debates. Thanks for helping me out with the rent suggestion for the dormitory. I guess it didn't occur to me some people who had built cabins on their own might be bitter." She glances at Daryl.

"Ain't bitter," he says. "But Jamestown did make me scavenge n' pay for every damn nail I used. And yer man there took 'bout five ounces of m' tobacco by the time he finished cuttin' 'n sawin' all them logs."

"Inola's making me quit smoking," Dante tells him.

"I'm not _making_ you," Inola insists. "I just said I don't like to kiss you after you've smoked."

"Yeah, she's _makin'_ ya," Daryl agrees with Dante, and Dante grins and nods.

"People always gets grumpy any time a new government benefit is handed out after they don't need it anymore," Gunther says as he deals out the cards. "Doesn't mean it's not a good idea going forward. But Carol's right. You have to appease the grumblers. And they do have a right to grumble. There's a certain amount of unfairness in it, just giving people for free what others have already worked and paid for."

"So I'll have your support for the dormitory if we charge a rent?" Inola asks him. "I mean, if we both end up on the Council?"

"Depends on the details of the plan, how much rent the Council demands, and the public reaction to it, but…quite likely." Gunther rearranges the cards in his hands. "I sure would like to get out of those barracks myself."

"I bet. I mean, where do you even whack off?" Dante asks.

"Dante!" Inola scolds him. "There are ladies present! Including me."

"Sorry."

"Why weren't you assigned one of the original huts or cabins?" Carol asks him as she picks, rearranges her cards, and discards. "You're the assistant farm manager, after all."

"It wasn't until Rodrigo was killed in the mutiny," Gunther answers, "and Ernesto moved up into the manager position that I moved up. I was just a farmer until then."

"A farmer Ernesto _frequently_ consulted for his opinion," Madam Linda says.

"But a farmer nonetheless. I didn't exactly have first dibs on housing."

"You never thought to build a place of your own?" Dante throws down his discard.

"I would have," Gunther replies, "if Megan had agreed to marry me, if she'd wanted to keep the baby."

"So the rumors are true?" Dante asks. "You _were_ the father?"

"I honestly don't know." Gunther picks up his hand and rearranges the cards. "But I would have been."

"Did you hear Commander Lawson wants to reopen the whorehut if he gets on the Council?" Inola asks. She lays down a 4-5-6 straight and discards.

"You shouldn't lay those down so soon!" Dante tells her. "Hold onto your cards for a while. Now Madam Linda can play off them."

Madam Linda does. She picks, rearranges her cards, puts down a three and a seven, and then discards. "You know, you can stop calling me _Madam_. I don't run the whorehut anymore. And it's never reopening, whatever Commander Lawson may want. There's only one woman who'd be willing to work there anymore. And I know she's already secretly freelancing with a limited and select clientele."

"I don't know how _select_ they are," Gunther says as he lays down a queen, which Carol picks up on her turn.

"I do worry Candy's going to get hurt one of these days," Madam Linda says. "Or pregnant. Though she claims she's avoiding anything that will cause that."

"Why would Commander Lawson even want to reopen the place?" Dante asks. "He's married."

"He thinks it would be good for the single men," Linda says. "That it would keep them from brawling with each other so much."

"I doubt that," Dante says. "Brawling's fun. Adahy and I both have our own women and we still brawled with each other the other day."

Inola shakes her head and laughs. "That wasn't a _brawl_. More like two brothers roughhousing."

"He's not my brother…" Dante peers at her over his cards, his smiling teeth flashing white in the glow of the oil lamps, " _yet_."

"Was that a proposal?" Carol asks him.

"No," Inola answers for him. "When he _does_ propose, he better do a better job than _that_. How did Daryl propose to you?"

Daryl's face feels suddenly hot, even though there's a light breeze coming off the river. His proposal was a bumbling mess, before their court verdict, and he dropped the damn ring. Carol's probably going to joke about it.

"It was very romantic," Carol says. "The perfect words. And he gave me this." Carol holds her cards in one hand and splays out her other hand for Inola to see the Cherokee rose ring. "This flower has a special meaning for me, and he looked very hard for this ring. Daryl's considerate that way."

"Awwww…" Inola takes her hand, looks more closely at the ring, and then lets go. "It's beautiful."

"Thanks, man," Dante says to Daryl. "Now I've got a bar to reach."

Daryl concentrates on rearranging his cards, embarrassed more by Carol's quiet praise than he would have been by her laughter.

When the hand is over, Linda is in the lead by twenty points. Cards are dealt and hands drawn up. Inola nods over Dante's shoulder at the glowing light that covers the circular window of one of the ship's cabins. "It looks like the captain's still up. And like maybe he has company." A paper blind slides down over the cabin window and blocks off all but the shadowy glow of the oil lamp inside.

Dante shakes his head. "I'm glad you never went out with him."

"I did," Inola replies. "Three times."

"Wait. What?" Dante asks. "You dated the _captain_? You never told me that!"

"I gave every man who asked me out at least one date. And I gave every man who made it to a second date at least one kiss."

"Even me," Gunther says. "A generous woman indeed."

"Shush it, man," Dante tells him. "I really don't need to be reminded that you've kissed my girlfriend." He looks across at Inola. "You didn't have _sex_ with him, did you?"

"No," Gunther says. "She shot me down like a – "

"- I meant the captain!" Dante interrupts. "I know she didn't sleep with _you_. Did you?" he asks Inola. "Sleep with the captain?"

"This is neither the time nor the place to discuss that," Inola tells him.

"Someone's turn," Daryl grumbles, irritated by the sex talk.

"Oh, it's mine," Gunther says. He picks up a card and lays down one.

"You know he's a bit of a playboy, right?" Dante asks. "The captain."

"Yes. That's why I stopped dating him," Inola answers. "I wonder if Sarah knows."

"They broke up days ago," Gunther tells her. "She found out he's having an affair with a married woman. I suppose you two missed that whole conversation in the tavern."

"What married woman?" Inola asks.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Gunther replies.

"I wonder if that's who's in there with him?" Dante looks over his shoulder at the ship.

"If it is," Inola replies, "she's probably waiting for us to stop playing cards out here so she can sneak back home."

"Who doesn't notice his wife missing from his bed at night?" Dante asks.

"Perhaps _both_ the husband and wife are in there," Gunther suggests. "A fine threesome. I mean, all y'all assumed the captain was gay."

" _Who_ assumed the captain was gay?" Inola asks in surprise.

Dante lowers his cards. "So you _have_ had sex with him?"

"We'll discuss it _later_ ," Inola insists.

"it just sounds like way too much swapping of bodily fluids is going on in this town!" Dante exclaims.

"Shhh!" Inola hisses and nods to Santiago, who had made his way through the museum and back out to the docks again. "You don't want a citation for after-hours noise disturbance." She peers at Gunther's flask. "What's in there anyway? What proof is it?"

"Dante didn't have that much." Gunther extends the flask to Inola. "Would you like a sip?"

"I only drink beer. And wine. But when was the last time someone made wine?"

"Well, I hope you voted for me," Gunther says. "I mentioned my plan to grow grapes in the debates."

"I did vote for you," Inola says. "I voted for everyone. It's a ranking system, remember?"

"Well, I hope you ranked me highly."

"I've always ranked you highly," Linda tells him, laying down all her cards. "And I'm out. And I'm also ready for bed. Walk me home?"

"The night is still young," Gunther tells her.

"Well I didn't say the night had to end. I just said walk me home."

Gunther shakes his head with a smile and stands. "I'll leave the cards for y'all." He walks around the table and holds out his hand to Linda, who takes it to stand up, but then he lets go. They walk off down the docks toward the path, side by side.

"Are they _dating_ now?" Dante asks.

"I don't think so," Inola says as she gathers the cards and shuffles. "She's fifteen years older than him."

"So. He's fifteen years old than you, and you went out with him."

"Yes, but you kept telling me he was too _old_ for me, remember?" Inola asks.

"Only because I was jealous," Dante admits as Inola deals. " _Are_ they dating?" he asks Daryl and Carol.

"Hell would I know?" Daryl replies. He wishes Gunther had left his flask and not just the cards.

Carol shrugs. "She clearly likes him, anyway. And they seem to be spending a lot of time together lately. I'm sure they're at least good friends." She smiles across the table at Daryl. "Kind of reminds me of us in the early days. I was always trying to flirt with you, and you were always brushing me off."

"What an _idiot_!" Dante exclaims with glee.

"Thought she was jokin'!" Daryl mutters.

"Except Gunther knows Linda's not joking." Carol picks up her hand and spreads out the cards. "He likes her. I just don't think he's attracted to her that way."

"Well, she _is_ a lot older than him," Inola repeats.

"So what?" Dante asks. "She's not _ugly_. And she ran a brothel for over five years. She's probably got mad skills."

"Dante!" Inola scolds him, but then she raises her cards to cover her laughing face.

"I'm just saying. She's a woman of profound experience."

Inola smacks his hand playfully with her cards, exposing a few cards as she does so. "Stop! She wasn't one of the prostitutes!"

"But I bet she taught them everything she knew," Dante says with a smirk. "Come on! Look at her. You can tell she was gorgeous in her thirties. Probably in her forties, too. Maybe even in her early fifties. And she's the businesswoman type. She's not the settling-down-at-home type. So you can _bet_ she had her fair share of flings."

Carol looks at Daryl. The happy way she forces her lips together to choke down her laughter blots out all his irritation at the gossipy exchange, and he smiles and ducks his head.

"Now that they're gone, though," Dante says, "can we play something _I_ have a chance of winning instead?"

"Go fish?" Daryl asks, and Inola and Carol both laugh. Dante frowns sternly at him. "Nah. Yer right," Daryl says. "Too much skill. We better play War."


	107. Chapter 107

Daryl's careful not to wake Carol in the morning when he eases from the bedroom. Garland is pushing down the handle on the French press. "Mornin'," Daryl murmurs. He glances toward the cribs, sees only a slumbering VanDaryl, and has a sudden jolt of panic. "Where the hell's m'baby?"

"Shannon's feeding her. They both probably fell back to sleep in bed." Garland pulls down two mugs from the hutch. "We can each have a full cup today." He pours Daryl's mug to the brim. "We got extra beans this month. It's just the way the calendar and the distributions fall. Like when you used to get that extra third paycheck, you know, back in the day."

"No. Dunno." Daryl pulls the cup toward himself. He has no idea what Garland's talking about.

"I guess you weren't paid biweekly."

"Pfft. Nah. Paid by the job." Daryl sips. "Sometimes at the end of the day, sometimes at the end of the week, sometimes at the end of the hour. Usually in cash."

Garland pours his cup and takes a sip, but he sets it down when Gary comes out of his parents' bedroom, rubbing his eyes. The preschooler stops and peers into Van Daryl's crib. "Shh," Garland tells him. "Don't wake the baby. And shut Mama's door. Quietly."

Gary obeys. After the door is shut, he pads in his bare feet across the floor and puts his little hands on the counter and peers up at the coffee. "Hawt chocowate?"

"Coffee."

Gary frowns. "I wanna have hawt chocowate!"

"Well, it's July. It's not a good month for hot chocolate. And we only have a little bit of chocolate to last us through the year."

Gary makes a hrmphing sound through his nose and lets go of the counter top. Then he looks suddenly more optimistic. "Apple jews?"

"I'll pour you a cup of water, son," Garland tells him. "It's Tuesday. Apple juice is for Friday's only. But you can have some fresh black currants. Have a seat at the table."

"No!" Gary puts a hand on his little hip, furrows his brow, and narrows his eyes at his father. "Not bwak cuwants," he demands. "Pwares!"

Daryl tenses, his muscles like memory stores for his own childhood, when he had the misfortune to defy his father like that.

But Garland only suppresses a smile. "You're going to need some prayers if you keep giving me that attitude, young man," he says calmly. He blows across the steamy top of his coffee and views his son mildly.

"Not pwares! PWARES. Yummy pwares."

"The pears won't be ready to pick until August," Garland tells him. "So you can have some black currants. Or you can have a swift kick in the pants. Whichever you would prefer."

Gary stops glowering and goes over to the table and drags himself up into a chair. "Oh-kay."

As Daryl watches the exchange, he can't help but think how differently that would have gone down in his cabin when he was a boy. He hopes he can be so calm the first time Sweetheart gives him lip, but he's not sure he will be. He'll never her hurt her, though, not physically, of that much at least he's certain.

Daryl retreats to the living room to tinker with his crossbow between sips of coffee. After Garland plops Gary's breakfast down on the table, he joins him.

"When we find out?" Daryl asks. "'Bout the 'lection?"

"Oh, I imagine the results are probably posted by now outside the Council Chamber doors," Garland replies. "The polls open in twenty minutes for citizens to vote for mayor."

Daryl sets his bow down abruptly. "I better wake Carol!"

"Don't wake her. Let her enjoy a morning of sleeping in. Relax. Finish your coffee."

[*]

After Gary is dropped off at preschool, the two couples head down to the council chambers to read the results. Sweetheart's head sticks up over Daryl's shoulder as she rides him piggyback in a child carrier scavenged from a picked-over Babies R Us. VanDaryl snuggles face-first against his mother's chest in a Baby Bjorn, his cheek turned to the left. As they walk, passing men and women along the path beside the fields and on the awakening docks, Daryl can make out snippets of conversation about the election:

 _Did you see the results?_

 _Not yet. I'll check them when I go to vote for mayor._

 _I hope the captain got elected. Isn't he handsome?_

 _Who did you rank in the top three?_

 _If Inola got elected, does that mean we're getting our own rooms?_

 _When do the polls close for mayor?_

 _Do you know if the commander's on the council now?_

 _God, I hope not. Next thing you know he'll want to kick all recent refugees out._

By the time they reach the council chambers, Daryl is none the wiser about the results. But they're posted for all to see, in big, handwritten black letters on a piece of white poster board taped to the wall a few feet from the open door.

Daryl chews on his thumbnail as he scans through the names over Carol's shoulder.

 **ELECTED COUNCILMEMEBRS:**

 **Garland Barron (re-elected)  
Captain David Cummins (re-elected)  
Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad (re-elected)  
Barry Borowsky (re-elected) _  
_Judge Anna Carter (re-elected)  
Dr. Carolyn Taylor (re-elected)  
Inola Chotka (newly elected)  
Gunther Hamilton (newly elected) _  
_Lieutenant James Witherspoon (newly elected)**

Daryl reads it again, just to make sure he didn't read it wrong, and then he rests a hand gently on Carol's shoulder. Her shoulders have completely fallen.

"Sorry, Carol," Garland murmurs.

Carol forces a weak smile to her face. "Well, it looks like you've got a good crew to work with there."

"Well that's just not right!" Shannon insists loudly. "You were robbed, Carol. That's what _I_ think. Who needs _two_ navy men on the council anyway?"

"Lieutenant Witherspoon's a young voice," Carol says. "The council could use that. Men like him will be Jamestown's future. And I suppose Captain Cummins has been here since the start, and he's well respected for his contributions to Jamestown."

She turns and walks into the open door of the council chambers, where the polls have just opened for the election for mayor. Daryl warily follows. Carol asks the court reporter, who is sitting at the check-in table, for a ballot.

"Carol Dixon, correct?" the older woman asks.

"That's me."

The court reporter smiles sympathetically as she scrolls through her list of citizens and checks off Carol's name. She hands her a paper ballot.

"Ya a'ight?" Daryl whispers from behind her.

"I'm fine," Carol insists and heads straight for one of the dividers.

The court reporter hands Daryl another paper ballot. "You remember how to do ranked voting?" she asks him as she crosses off his name directly below Carol's.

"Yes'm," he murmurs. He takes the paper and heads over next to Carol, but she's already folding her ballet, and she walks over to the box, drops it in, and abruptly walks out at a fast, almost angry pace.

Frantically, he seizes the pencil that has rolled from his grasp. Sweetheart gurgles on his back as Daryl bends to quickly mark his ballot with scribbled numbers:

 **Declared Candidates for Mayor and Chairman of the Council**

 **_1_ Garland Barron (I)**

 **_3_ Captain David Cummins**

 **_2_ Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad**

As he shoves his ballot in the slot of the ballot box, Garland is taking up a spot along the table to vote. Daryl hastens out to find Carol. He looks up and down the hallway but can't figure what direction she went. He paces down the hall, through the open, emptied orphanage, to the left exit door, and peers out to see nothing, so he paces back.

Garland is emerging from the council chambers when Daryl gets there, and Shannon is coming down the opposite hallway toward them both.

"Seen Carol?" Daryl asks when Shannon comes to a stop before them.

"Yeah," Shannon replies. "I tried to talk to her, but I really think she just needs to work off the disappointment. She said she was going to go put in an hour in the orchard before her patrol shift."

"Orchard's near the village?" Daryl asks.

"I'd just leave her alone for now if I were you, Daryl," Shannon says gently. "Just get your hunting done early so you can be there for her tonight when she's _not_ being installed."

Daryl nods. He'll take Shannon's advice because he knows she cares about Carol and wouldn't purposefully steer him wrong. Besides, he doesn't know what the hell to say to her right now.

Shannon runs a hand up and down VanDaryl's back through the carrier. "I'm going in to vote for you, baby," she tells Garland before kissing him on the cheek and disappearing into the polls.

"You best head back to the cabin and get your bow and dog," Garland tells him. "I'll walk with you."

"Can y'all watch Sweetheart while I hunt?" It doesn't sound like Carol will be home any part of the morning.

"One of us will." Garland falls in step beside Daryl, and together they walk out of the museum.

The docks have begun to bustle with activity as one of the ships prepares to leave. A sailor unties a rope and throws it onto the deck. "Congratulations!" he shouts up to Captain Cummins and Lieutenant Witherspoon on the deck of the _Susan Constant_. "I heard you both got elected!" Captain Cummins tips his hat down at him while Lieutenant Witherspoon shouts a thank you.

Daryl turns his gaze away and picks up his pace. When they're on the dirt path and walking past the corn field, in earshot of no one but the scarecrow, Daryl asks, "Did ya know she was gonna lose?" Garland didn't seem in any hurry to get there to check those names, and he didn't seem particularly surprised when Carol's name wasn't on that list.

"Carol _just_ got her citizenship," Garland replies. "She's respected for her role in thwarting the mutiny, but she's still very new here. People like an occasional change, but mostly they're comfortable with the familiar. So they re-elected six out of six of the incumbents who ran. Because the farm manager didn't run again, they went for the assistant farm manager. I suppose all the builder-types and anyone crammed in those barracks supported Inola. It was all very predictable. The only real question in my mind was whether they'd elect Deputy Thomas or Lieutenant Witherspoon."

"So ya knew she was gonna lose?"

"I thought she had perhaps a ten percent chance of winning."

"Why the hell didn't ya tell her so, then?" Daryl growls loudly. In the backpack, Sweetheart whimpers at the sound of her father's anger and bends her little head and rubs it against his shoulder.

"Let me ask you something, Daryl," Garland replies gently. "If I had told Carol I thought she had such a slim chance of winning, do you think she would have run?"

Nah! Probably not. 'S the whole damn point!" When he hears Sweetheart whimper on his back again, Daryl lowers his voice. "Could of saved 'er all this disappointment." Sweetheart begins sucking on her entire fist in a gesture of self-soothing. A little bit of spittle drips onto his shirt.

"By running for council, Carol got to know a lot of people," Garland says. "And they got to know her better. She got to learn more about the workings of Jamestown. And she put some of her very good ideas out to the public through the debate. Those ideas are being talked about now. But she's not quite ready, Daryl. She's not well enough entrenched in Jamestown yet. You have to know these people, _really_ know them, to govern them. But she _will_ be ready. Next year. And because she began the process now, because she got her name out there and started to get involved and started to think seriously about the changes people need and want, she'll win next year. She'll be on the council. And I believe she'll make an excellent councilwoman. But that would not be possible if she had not thrown her hat in the ring _now_. If she hadn't done this now, it would take her two more years to get on that council instead of just one. And _that's_ why I didn't tell her I thought she would lose."

"Yer an asshole, you know that?" Daryl mutters. "'Specially when yer right."

Garland chuckles. "Just make sure this doesn't bring her down and that she sets her mind on running again next year. Do that, would you?"

"Do m'best."

[*]

It's embarrassing, walking to the orchard, past whispering people who have probably heard the results by now. Maybe they don't notice her at all, but Carol feels like they're tossing her a mixture of sympathetic and smug looks. The Kingdom people probably voted for her, but they're less than five percent of the population of Jamestown. Maybe she got a handful of votes from new friends, too, but that would hardly be enough. What was she thinking, running for a spot on the council? They must all think she's full of herself.

When she reaches the three rows of dwarf trees in a field alongside the river, she looks up at the first tree in the second row, one with budding pears. The fruit is tiny and misshapen and looks like it doesn't quite belong on the branches.

"They're new and struggling," Gunther says as he emerges from behind another tree and slides a small pair of pruning shears into a holster on his work belt, "but you'll be surprised how fast they grow. They just need a little time to become one with the tree. Then they'll be ripe for the plucking."

She turns to face him. "Congratulations on your election. I suppose you heard?"

"Yes. Thank you." He tips down his straw farmer hat to hide his expression. Because he can't say congratulations back, he clears his throat and changes the subject. "What brings you to the orchard?"

"I want to work. Just for an hour before my patrol shift. The time can go toward Shannon's rations. She's always watching Sweetheart, so I figure I owe her. Do you supervise the orchard, too?"

"They lump the orchards and the gardening in with the farming, even though they're different arts. I'm going to ask the council to appoint a separate orchard and garden manager. I'm sure someone will call it bloated administration, but we're planting new fields ever year, building new barns, breeding more animals, and it's getting a bit much for two men to manage it _all_."

A man approaches them holding a large, long pair of pruning shears, and another follows with a folded-up ladder. "Ernesto sent us."

"Third tree from the end, second row," Gunther tells them. "Prune it all the way down."

"Yes, sir."

Gunther grabs hold of one of the bushels stacked between two trees and hands it to Carol. "You get to pluck plums. First two trees in the first row. There's already a step ladder down there. No eating the produce while you work."

"Yes, sir," she echoes the other men with a smirk and begins to walk toward the plum trees.

"Carol," Gunther calls after her. She pauses and turns. "Just because you aren't on the council doesn't mean you can't participate in the governance of Jamestown," he tells her. "Don't forget we have twice weekly open town halls. Anyone can propose anything, and I for one sure would like to hear more about the possibility of establishing a trade alliance. Especially if any of your old Oceanside friends make rum."

Carol smiles. "I'm sure you'll be seeing my face around the council chambers." She turns and finds the ripe plum trees, bursting with fully formed fruit.


	108. Chapter 108

The bear pit is empty except for a walker. "Ugly skank," Daryl mutters as he lets fly an arrow straight into its forehead. The rotting knees buckle, and the creature slumps like a puddle of clothes onto the dirt floor.

Daryl uses the rope tied to the metal stake outside the pit to propel himself down. He ties the desiccated body of the walker up in the rope, and Mitch pulls it up. A couple minutes later, the empty rope falls down again. Daryl avoids the rotting flesh stuck to a few spots and climbs hand over hand out of the pit. "She fresh?"

"A year, maybe?" Mitch guesses. "Maybe one of those Williamsburg people. They all got scattered, the ones who lived. I wonder if any are still alive?"

"Doubt it."

"Santiago's kid stayed alive. And that group that had your baby."

Dwight and Sherry stayed alive anyhow. Not Sweetheart's parents. It's strange to think he's only a father because someone else couldn't live to be.

Mitch slides his rifle off his shoulder and checks the safety. He raises the rifle, stares down the scope, and fires.

Daryl turns. "Seriously?" he asks. "Wasted a bullet on a woodchuck?"

Mitch shrugs. "Well, I need the target practice. And they do taste good."

"Ain't gonna be much meat left after we dig out the shot." Daryl whistles to Dog. "Fetch!" The canine bounds happily through the trees to retrieve the slain animal. He drops it at Daryl's feet. Daryl unsheaths his knife and crouches down to skin it. "Hell," he murmurs apologetically. "Damn good shot. Back of the skull. Nothin' wasted. Probably get three or four pounds of meat out it."

"And I bet there's more where that came from."

Later, as they're walking back toward Jamestown, each dangling two skinned woodchucks from their shoulders, Daryl says, "Congrats on yer man winnin'."

Mitch's footsteps slow. " _What?_ "

"Uh…" They weren't words Daryl thought about before speaking them. He was just trying to make polite conversation – something he's oh-so-gradually been learning to do over the past few years - and it seemed like something to say. "Lieutenant Witherspoon."

"Why do you call him _my_ man?"

"Just…thought… mean, ya said ya had a sailor 'n…nevermind."

Mitch sighs. He shifts the woodchuck on his right shoulder and his rifle on his left. "We used to screw sometimes, but he was never _mine_. He doesn't _want_ to be mine. He wants to keep it all on the down low. I guess I had enough of that, so I put a stop to the whole thing two weeks ago. It's just as well. He's too young. We don't have much in common."

"Mhm."

"I'm glad he won, though. He's smart. He's passionate about Jamestown. He'll do well. How did you guess it was him?"

"Carol…she told me."

"How did she guess?"

Daryl shrugs. "Dunno. She thought it was Harry at first."

Mitch laughs. "James – Lieutenant Witherspoon – made a subtle pass at Harry once, and Harry shot him down and told him he was _straight as an arrow_. Harry kept it to himself, but he's ribbed James about it privately ever since. And me, too, ever since he figured out we were…you know. Does anyone else know? About me and James?"

"Nah. No. Ain't like I blabbed."

"Well, you apparently told Carol."

Dog sniffs the ground and trots on ahead. "Sorry," Daryl mutters.

"She's your wife. I guess things come up."

"If anyone else knows, it ain't 'cause of me or 'er, man. Swear. But this town gossips all the fuckin' time."

Mitch smirks. "There's not much else to do some days. And I've heard it all. I've heard the captain is secretly gay. I've heard that Dr. Ahmad is secretly gay. I've heard that Judge Ana Carter's baby is not really the sheriff's baby. I've heard that the assistant farm manager was in love with one of the prostitutes, and she killed herself trying to abort his baby. I've heard that the veterinarian is lying about being a lesbian because she's just waiting for the right man, and every unmarried man thinks he's going to turn out to be that man. And I've heard you and Garland swap wives on occasion."

"What?" Daryl barks.

"Nobody believes that one."

"But who the hell's _sayin'_ it?" Daryl demands.

"I think Commander Lawson started it. He talks all sorts of shit about any group of refugees we've taken in during the last few years. And that includes Shannon. His brother was killed in that raid Shannon's old camp conducted. He's still angry about it. He thinks we should have put a moratorium on taking people in after 3 NE."

"Why 3 NE?"

"Well, because _he_ came in as a refugee toward the end of 2 NE."

"Ah."

"Glad _he_ didn't win," Mitch mutters. "At least this town's got some sense. Sorry about Carol not making it, though. How's she handling it?"

"Dunno. Not too well. Disappointed, I guess."

"Well, tell her I ranked her number five, if it's any help." Mitch lithely hops over a fallen tree.

Daryl wonders who Mitch ranked ahead of her, but he doesn't ask. Dog has sniffed his way to a hollowed-out hole in the bottom of an oak tree and is barking inside it.

"What ya find, boy?" Daryl asks. It turns out to be an abandoned litter of fox kits.

Mitch looks around the forest for signs of the mother and, finding no tracks, asks, "What do you think happened to her?"

"Dunno. Think Jamestown could use a fox farm?"

"We could feed them fish byproducts until they're grown. Recycle our food waste."

Daryl turns and looks back in the direction from which they came. "'S go back and get that cage from the rabbit trap."

[*]

After her four-hour patrol shift, Carol does a bit of work in the gardens, which makes for a seven-hour day total. She washes up her hands and face in one of the washing troughs and then goes to change her clothes for the installation ceremony.

She's just snapping the button on a fresh pair of jeans when the door creaks open and Daryl comes in with one hand hidden behind his back. He shuts the door behind himself and says, "Got somethin' to cheer ya up."

She smiles uncertainly. "What?"

He draws his arm forward. Splayed over part of his upper arm and his hand, and nibbling on his thumb, is a little red-and-brown, doglike creature.

"You brought me a puppy?"

"'S a kit. Fox. We found six of 'em. 'Bout five-weeks-old, likely."

Carol cautiously steps forward, peers down at it, and laughs. "It's adorable, but I think it wants to eat your hand."

"Nah. He's just playin'. He just ate some fish."

"This is a _pet_?"

"Fox don't make good pets. He'll tear shit up. Fight with Dog. Kill the chickens when he gets bigger. Gonna put 'em in an enclosure with the others, raise 'em 'til they're grown."

"And then what?"

"Eat 'em."

Carol shakes her head. "And that's supposed to cheer me up?"

"Thought ya'd think he was cute!"

Carol laughs. "He _is_ cute. He's adorable. And so are you." She kisses his cheek. "You better go put him with his siblings."

"A'ight," Daryl says. "Just thought it'd cheer ya up."

"It _did_ cheer me up. Thank you. Will you come with me to the installation?"

"Ya wanna go to that?" Daryl asks incredulously.

"We should support Garland. And Inola and Gunther, too."

"Why Gunther?"

"Because he's a _friend_ ," she says. "At least to me." Interesting that he didn't object to her wanting to support Garland or Inola. "He gave me a bit of a pep talk today. It was helpful."

"More helpful than the kit, huh?" He repositions the little creature, which has begun gnawing on his thumb again.

"The fox made me smile."

"Sure ya wanna go?"

"I'll look like a sore loser if I don't go. I'm sure all the other losers will be there."

Daryl looks at her warily, like she's a kettle that's about to whistle. "A'ight. Be back in a bit 'n go with ya." He stops halfway out the door and pops his head back in. "Oh. 'N you were right. Mitch was fuckin' the lieutenant. If that makes ya feel any better."

"Why would that make me feel any better?"

He shrugs. "'Cause you were right? Shit, Carol. 'M tryin. I ain't got no pep talks like Mr. Smooth-Talking Strawhat, but 'm _tryin_."

Carol smiles affectionately. "You don't have to _try_ , Daryl. You love me, and you believe in me. That's enough." She steps forward and kisses his nose. "Hurry back."

[*]

When Daryl returns, he's scrubbed his hands and lower arms with lime soap, but he doesn't change his grungy clothes. There's no time anyway. "Ya look real pretty," he tells Carol because she does, all nicely dressed for the installation, in her most intact pair of blue jeans and a charcoal shirt that sets off her baby blues. But he also tells her because he wants her to feel better.

"Thank you. Would you put Sweetheart in your pack? The Barrons have already left."

They walk quickly to the theater where the installation service is taking place and arrive just as it starts. The new council is lined up in front of the movie screen. The theater's not quite as crowded as it was during the debates. People must not care as much about these formal ceremonies. There are about forty people present, mostly close friends and family of the nine council members. Judge Ana Carter does the swearing in of everyone but herself, which is done by the court's bailiff - Deputy Andrew, who did not win a seat.

Sheriff Earl, who is MCing the ceremony as he did the debates, announces, "I'm sure y'all have seen the results of the election for mayor." Because the polls closed at 2 PM, and there were only three candidates, those ballots could be tallied in the afternoon. Daryl hasn't seen the results, but he can guess who won, and Earl confirms it: "Garland Barron has been re-elected for his second term as Mayor of New Jamestown."

Shannon yelps from the audience, "Way to go, baby!" and Garland flushes beet red while the audience chuckles.

Sheriff Earl clears his throat. "This will be his last term as mayor, due to the two-year term limit, but the council has six-year term limits, so we might still see him again next year on the council. Garland, would you step forward for the swearing in?"

Garland does, and the judge performs his swearing in on a copy of the town's charter. "Do you solemnly swear to uphold the charter of New Jamestown," Ana asks, "and to serve this community with honesty and integrity, to the best of your ability?"

"I do."

The whole thing doesn't last more than fifteen minutes, but Carol stays by the door until everyone has filtered out, congratulating each of the council members as they depart, like a pastor after church. Daryl lingers in the back of the theater, a few yards away, with Sweetheart nodding off in the pack on his back.

"Congratulations, again, Gunther," Carol says as the farmer nears the exit.

Gunther pauses and puts a hand on the side of her shoulder. "I'm glad you came for the installation. Don't forget what I said. Our first open town hall is Friday at noon."

"I'll be there."

Gunther moves on. He catches Daryl eyeing him and nods, and Daryl, looking away, forces down the petty jealousy that's starting to weave its tentacles up through his chest.

Carol congratulates Inola next, as she walks down the aisle toward the door with Dante by her side. "Sorry you didn't make it on the council," Inola stops to tell her. "You really had some great ideas. You and I should get a drink at the Tavern together sometime, discuss your idea about rent for the dormitory a little more."

"I'd like that," Carol agrees. Next she turns to the approaching judge. "Congratulations, Ana."

The judge slows to a stop while Sheriff Earl waits for her, his thumbs hooked impatiently through his belt loops. "Thank you," she tells Carol. "You know, I'm glad you ran after all. I thought having more women on the ballot would hurt some of our chances, but maybe you actually helped tip the scales a little. We have _three_ women on the council now instead of just two. That's _almost_ proportional with our percentage of the population."

Carol smiles. "Who knows. Maybe we'll have four next year."

"Maybe," Ana agrees. "And if so, I hope you're one of them."

Carol glances at the judge's not-yet-showing stomach. "It might be easier for women to put in that extra time on the council if Jamestown established a daycare co-op for the ones too young to go to preschool. There would always be coverage for council meetings, in case the other parent happens to have to work during ne."

"We should talk about that sometime," Ana agrees, and when Earl clears his throat, she puts a hand on the small of his back and walks on with him.

It suddenly occurs to Daryl that Carol isn't just trying to prove she's not a sore loser. She's _working the room_. She's making sure her agenda gets enacted whether or not she's behind that council table. His woman is damn sneaky. Daryl smiles and ducks his head to hide his smirk from the exiting crowd.

[*]

They return to the Barron cabin with Shannon, because Garland has to stay behind. The new council is assembling in the council chambers for its first closed-door meeting of the new term. As they walk, Carol reaches up and strokes Sweetheart's fuzzy, light brown hair. The baby stirs slightly in her sleep, and Carol drops her hand, from Sweetheart's head to the small of Daryl's back. "You know," she says, "maybe it's not such a bad thing I lost. The council is twenty hours of work a week for ten hours of rations. I'd be working at least thirty hours a week just for the basics. Now I can spend more time with my family."

Daryl thinks of one of the fables in that Aesop book Garland gave him when he was in that jail cell – the one about the fox and the sour grapes. And he thinks that Carol _doesn't_ sound like that fox – instead she sounds sincere. His burden instantly lightens when he sees that she's not hurting. He slings an arm loosely around her shoulders. "Gonna like havin' ya 'round."


	109. Chapter 109

A week passes, and the roof of the cabin is completed. The chinking needs time to dry. Daryl has already paid Dante to size, cut, sand, and hand carve the front door. He wants it to look good – one artistic touch for Carol's sake. He's entrusted Dante with the pattern, and the big man says it will take three weeks. By then, Daryl will have laid the wood floor and sanded and finished the shutters.

Today, however, Daryl has turned his attention to the hunt. Now, he struts down the docks with his kill slung over his shoulder, Dog nipping at his heels, and Mitch carrying more small game beside him. Fish are being dumped by the net-full on the docks, where they flip and flop as they await the knives of the cleaners.

The hunters turn down the dirt path and begin to pass the fields bursting with snap beans, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes, and squash. Mitch glances out over the ripening corn. "Ever worry our skill set is going to become obsolete?"

Daryl grunts a question mark.

"The farming and fishing industry just keep growing," Mitch explains himself. "We're becoming an agricultural civilization again. The hunters and gatherers…the sun is once again setting on our time."

"Pffft."

Mitch is one of those introverts, Daryl thinks, who doesn't talk _until_ he gets really comfortable with someone - and then he never shuts up. Still, it's almost never small talk with Mitch. It's always some grand subject – the collapse of civilization, the perpetuation of the species, the place of art and literature in a post-apocalyptic world, the existence or non-existence of God. Today, apparently, it's the future of Jamestown.

"Seriously," Mitch continues, "once they begin to breed more livestock more successfully, and the animals continue to multiply…what do you think they're going to need this for?" He nods to the two groundhogs held by a rope over his back. "They want us to bring in wild game now, to keep more of the cows and goats and sheep for milk, and the chickens for eggs, but some day there will be enough animals to slaughter routinely, and then are they really going to want to pay us full rations for bringing in gamey, greasy meat?"

"Jamestown'll always need hunters. Fields 're growing, but the population's growin', too. "N shit happens. Drought. Worms. Be dumbasses _not_ to keep huntin'." Daryl's footsteps slow to a stop as they near a freshly turned bit of earth that was left fallow for a season but is now being prepared for planting. A low, wooden fence surrounds it, and Gunther stands just inside the fence line, leaned against a hoe. Carol stands just outside the fence talking to him. She laughs at something he says.

"Go on," Daryl tells Mitch. "Catch up to ya at the butcher's." He detours off the dirt path to wander toward the fence, where Gunther is still talking to Carol. Dog looks back and forth between Daryl and Mitch for a moment before dutifully following his owner.

Gunther stops talking when Daryl is within earshot, and Carol turns to follow the farmer's gaze. "Hey," she says when she spies Daryl. "What did you get?"

"Groundhog," Daryl mutters.

Carol looks doubtfully at the carcasses.

"Well, next week it's beef," Gunther says, shifting his straw hat down to shield his hazel eyes from the sun. He continues to hold the hoe upright in his other hand. "We're slaughtering one of the older cows. She's stopped giving us milk. But she should give us at least 390 pounds of meat."

"I'm really looking forward to it," Carol says. "It's rare we get to eat _beef_ anymore." She laughs. "Remember when you could just buy it at the grocery store? All wrapped in cellophane?"

Daryl makes a hrmphing sound. He shifts the heavy rope with the groundhogs on his shoulder – the groundhogs that, once butchered, will supply only seven to eight pounds of meat. "Ya workin'?" he asks, looking down at the deputy star pinned to Carol's shirt.

"I'm on patrol."

"Don't look like yer patrolin'."

"Gunther called me over to show me the new field. We're going to have pumpkins for Halloween," she says with a hint of excitement. Carol does love her holiday traditions.

"Mhm."

"Maybe I'll make you a pie."

"Mhm. Be good."

"I guess I'll have to sweeten it with honey. We don't have sugar anymore."

"Oh, but we will," Gunther says. "I've been growing sugarcane in the eastern greenhouse. It's like the tropics in there." Daryl turns his gaze back to Gunther. The farmer steps back from the fence and tilts his hoe. "Well, it was nice talking to you, Carol. Hope that situation gets resolved." He nods to Daryl and then returns to his work.

"What situation?" Daryl asks as Carol turns to walk back toward the dirt path.

"Oh, a domestic. Bob and Mary again. I thought things were better, with the counseling, but she smacked him with a cast iron frying pan this afternoon." They rejoin the path and stand in the center of it. "He's in the infirmary. He had quite the goose egg. He doesn't want to press charges, so _I'm_ pressing them this time, on behalf of the law. But I'm not sure how it will go over in court if he won't testify. I wish they would just agree to separate."

"Mhm. 'S that what ya were talkin' to Gunther 'bout?"

"That and other things." She rests a palm on the butt of her handgun. "I have to finish my rounds down to the museum and back."

Daryl nods back to the groundhog slung over his shoulder. "Gotta drop these at the butcher."

"Listen, Inola wants to meet me to talk about my idea for renting the rooms when the dorm is built. She invited me to dinner at the tavern this evening. Can you be home to watch Sweetheart? Garland's going to be working late, and Shannon wants to take the boys to dinner at a friend's cabin."

"Mhmh. Yeah. Sure. Gunther gonna be there?"

"At Shannon's friend's?" asks Carol, looking confused.

"At the tavern."

"Oh. Probably. He's often at the tavern."

"Mhm. Well, enjoy yer dinner." Daryl hitches the rope up further on his shoulder and plods on up toward the fort, his boots falling heavy on the tiny pebbles scattered in the dirt path.

[*]

Another week passes. Daryl cuts and sizes and sands all the wood planks he will need for the cabin's floor. Inola gets her dormitory building project approved by the council. With Carol's advice, she suggests a rent of one extra hour of labor per week to be charged for each room. The council is pleased with the compromise. Over time, those additional twenty-four hours of labor a week will result in enough production to make the investment in the dormitory worthwhile, and the future residents are pleased to think they can one day have a room all to themselves for just a little effort.

Dante and a few other men begin cutting down trees for lumber for the dormitory. Santiago and Sarah are sent to scavenge for additional building supplies. After a night on the road, the scavengers return with a cart full of bricks, a few fresh tools, nails, screws, lumber, and secretive smiles.

"I think those two did _it_ ," Shannon says at dinner in the Barron cabin that night, "don't you, Carol?"

"They both did seem happy when they came back, but it could have just been finding that stash."

Daryl plops his spoon into his stew. "Ya know, people're sittin' 'round gossipin' 'bout _us_ just like this."

"And what are they saying, Pookie?" Carol asks teasingly.

"That me and Garland swap wives."

"What?" Garland ask sharply.

"Oh, baby, that's just Commander Lawson and his wife blabbing." Shannon stirs her stew with her spoon to cool it. "You know how they are. He would have been third in the line of power if you hadn't suggested replacing the hierarchy with an elected council. Now he's a _nobody_ in the government, and instead of just you and the captain being over him, a twenty-five-year-old lieutenant, a farmer, a hunter, a doctor, and three women all have more power than he does. He can't stand it."

"People think we're swingers?" Garland asks in disbelief.

"No one believes that, baby! Everyone knows you are _way_ too much of a prude to ever be doing any kind of swinging. Now they might think _I'd_ be into it." She shrugs and lifts her spoon. "But it takes four to tango."

Carol laughs. "Well, I can assure you _no one_ is tangoing with _my_ husband. Except _me_."

Daryl flushes.

"What do you _mean_ you might be into it?" Garland splutters.

"I didn't _say_ I might be into it. I said _people_ might _think_ I'm into it." Shannon cocks her head at Garland. "How was the council meeting this afternoon, baby?"

The question seems to distract him from his temporary upset. "Good. Everyone is settling in nicely." Garland takes a sip of sweet tea. "Gunther says you're coming to the open town hall again tomorrow, Carol?"

Daryl looks up from his soup. Gunther sure seems to know a lot about his wife's plans.

"Yes," Carol replies. "And I will _keep_ coming to every open town hall until the council takes an official vote on establishing that trade route."

[*]

Daryl slathers glue on one edge of a wooden plank balanced on his work stand. Raul holds it steady by the dry side and asks, "What do you know about Kelly Hopkins?"

Daryl runs the brush all the way up to the front of the plank, comes back, and dips it in the glue again. "Kingdom woman," Daryl mumbles.

"Yeah, I know. That's why I thought you'd know her. Do you know how old she is? My dad tells me it's rude to ask a woman her age, so I couldn't ask _her_."

"Dunno. Twenty-four maybe." He dabs the glue to fill in some missed spots. "Yer age."

"I'm barely twenty-one."

Daryl lays the brush across the glue can and comes around to the dry side of the plank. "Lift," he orders. Raul grabs it by one end and Daryl by another, and they walk it carefully into the cabin.

"She has a boyfriend," Raul says. "Some guard. I think he's twenty-six. She didn't say they were going steady, though."

"Down easy," Daryl tells him as they crouch to lay the plank. "Line it up. Flush." They push it against another plank that is already in place on the earth. "Hold it steady a minute."

"I had a girlfriend once," Raul tells him as they hold the plank in place to make sure the glue has begun to adhere. "In Williamsburg. Before the place got overrun. She was with a group that tried to wait it out in the courthouse."

Daryl doesn't reply. He knows how this story ends. They saw the boarded-up courthouse in Williamsburg, the walkers scratching at the windows from the _inside_.

"I saw her father boarding up the last window, and I begged him to let me in, but he refused. He said there was no time. He just kept nailing in the boards. He left me for dead out there. Thing is, I survived. And none of them did. I ran and I dodged and I got out. They were trapped for days, maybe weeks. They died and turned in there."

Raul stands, so Daryl does, too. He follows the young man back out to slather the next plank with glue. "Did Kelly ever have a boyfriend in the Kingdom?" Raul asks.

"Uh…" Daryl tries to remember anything about Kelly's role in the Kingdom at all. "Worked in the school, I think. Taught violin, maybe?"

"She directed the children's choir," Raul says.

"Yeah. That."

"And cleaned up in the cafeteria after common meals. And now she works and sleeps in the orphanage, keeping an eye on the kids. I know all that. She's told me all that. But she didn't mention if she had a boyfriend back then."

"Dunno," Daryl admits. "Don't 'member seein' 'er with anyone, not regular."

"But maybe irregular?"

"Hell, kid, I dunno!"

"Sorry," Raul mutters. They walk the plank into the cabin, set it down, and hold.

Daryl, feeling guilty for his impatience, asks, "'S matter if she did?"

Raul shrugs. "I just wonder if I'd seem, you know… inexperienced to her. My girlfriend in Williamsburg, she was my first girlfriend. Ever. And we never…you know. Not all the way. So I'm not really…experienced or whatever."

"Raul, man," Daryl's careful to say _man_ this time instead of his usual _kid_ \- "ya can shoot well. Ya can kill walkers. Ya can mix medicines. Identify poisons. Scavenge. Turn a field 'n help build a cabin. Ya can keep a baby alive for two weeks, keep yerself alive alone for months. Ya ain't inexperienced."

"I wasn't talking about _that_ kind of experience."

"Hell kind of experience ya think a girl's lookin' for in this day 'n age? 'Sides, yer fuckin' rich with that stash of food and ammo ya keep buildin'. Yer the shit, kid." He can't help the _kid_ this time. It just slips out. "Ya got it all." Daryl stands.

Raul smiles and stands, too. "Come on. You _know_ what I'm talking about. There's, like, thirty guys here between the age of twenty and thirty-five Kelly could choose from. And maybe she _is_ going steady with that guard. I don't know. She never said. Just said they'd gone out a few times."

As they return to slather another board with glue, Daryl wonders how he became Raul's sounding board. He's not exactly a relationship guru. But other than Santiago, Raul still shies away from men for the most part. He still flinches if one of them touches him in a friendly way or steps inside his zone of personal space. Maybe that's why he's more comfortable with Daryl. Daryl doesn't like his space invaded, either, and he's not exactly the touchy feely type.

Later, when they're resting from their work and swigging water from their canteens, Daryl ventures, "Don't matter if she's got a boyfriend. Can still be friends. Me and Carol…hell, we were friends for years 'fore…well, 'fore we were more." Then again, maybe they were always more. There was always something there that the word _friendship_ couldn't fully describe.

"I don't know," Raul mumbles.

"'S good to have friends. Didn't used to think so. Thought it was easier to go it alone. Kept to m'self 'n m'brother. Didn't trust people. Didn't get close to 'em. But it _ain't_ easier. Ya can't do things without people anymore."

"I mean I don't know about trying to be friends with her if she has a steady boyfriend. A guy could start a fight that way."

"Only if 'er boyfriend's an asshole. Ain't everyone like Jackson 'round here."

"So, you'd be fine if Carol was…I don't know…" Raul fidgets with the top of his canteen. "Going to the movies with some other man? Once a week or something? As friends? Just the two of them? For fun? Or if they, say, got together for a drink after work, you know, just to talk about stuff that interested them? Once or twice a week or something?"

"Uh…well…" Daryl wasn't thinking about it _quite_ like that.

"Would you?" Raul asks skeptically.

"Yeah," he half lies. "If it made 'er happy." Daryl shrugs and scratches the back of his head. "Hell would I care?" That's what he _says_ – but right now he's imagining Carol going to the movies with Gunther, or talking and laughing with him at a table for two in the tavern, and he doesn't like the image one bit. "Fuck, I dunno," he admits finally and takes another swig from his canteen. "Don't take advice from me." He tightly twists the cap back on.

They finish laying the floor, which has to dry, and that leaves only the shutters and the door before Daryl can make the grand reveal. As they stand just outside the open entryway, looking at their handy work on the floor, Daryl claps Raul on the shoulder. He doesn't mean to. He's not a toucher usually. But it's a job well done and he feels like communicating that in some unspoken away. Only after his hand comes down does he remember how much abuse Raul has received at the hands of men, and how little he likes to be touched by them.

Raul looks down at Daryl's hand on his shoulder, but he doesn't jerk away. Daryl draws his hand off the young man and steps slightly aside. "Hell, man," he murmurs. "Maybe bein' friends with Kelly _would_ start a fight with 'er boyfriend. But ya know…ya could always start a fight _and_ win it."

Raul chuckles. "I think I better keep my head down and stay out of trouble. At least until I'm a citizen in a few more weeks." He grins. "Then all bets are off."


	110. Chapter 110

Carol eases the bedroom door shut.

"She back asleep?" Daryl asks.

"Yeah. She got her arm stuck in between the slats of the crib again and couldn't get it out on her own. Maybe we should put a bumper up so that doesn't keep happening."

"Book says no bumpers. Says bumpers can suffocate a baby to death."

Carol plops down in a sitting position on the bed. "Daryl, _What to Expect the First Year_ is _not_ the Holy Bible." She swings her legs under the sheet and lies back. The shutters are open to reveal a sliver of moonlight, which dances across Daryl's masculine jawline. "But I really appreciate that you've done your research. You've really stepped up." He's silent, not in his usual _I've got nothing to say_ way, but in that tense way that makes her think she's said something wrong. "Daryl?"

"Ya didn't think I would?" he asks quietly. "Step up?"

"Of course I did! I guess I just didn't expect you to be so academic about it."

That answer seems to relax him. "Mhm, well, managed to pass 7th grade Home Ec."

"You took Home Ec? Not Shop?"

"Yeah, that, too. But everyone had to take Home Ec. Boys n' girls both."

"Really?" Carol asks skeptically. In her school, it was an either/or proposition, and the boys who choose Home Ec were few and far between and usually about the right size to be stuffed in a locker – which they often were.

"Yep."

"And you did well?"

"Hell, no," he mutters. "Said I _passed_. Didn't say I did well. Scraped by with a D of course."

Carol chuckles.

"Had to carry these egg babies around."

"Egg babies?" Carol asks.

"Hard boiled eggs that were s'posed to be our babies. S'posed to make sure they didn't get cracked."

"Well, that's hardly a realistic approximation of parenting. Did you keep yours from cracking?"

"Nah. I beamed it at Johnny McIntire when he called me a hillbilly. Hit him straight in the forehead with it. _Hard_ , too. It cracked all to shit."

Carol giggles and rolls on her side to settle her head on his shoulder. "Who calls anyone a _hillbilly_?"

"Johnny McIntire, 's who," Daryl grumbles. "'S dad was the town lawyer 'n his mom was the school principal. Thought he was hot shit."

"And where's Johnny McIntire now? I doubt he's a hunter _and_ legend."

"Stahp."

"He probably doesn't have a hot wife either."

"Pffft. Nah, probably not." Daryl kisses her. "He probably ain't about to get laid good 'n hard neither."

Carol purses her lips. "Pookie, no, sorry. Not tonight."

"'S been awhile."

"It's been _two days_."

"Four," he says.

"Three at _most._ You exaggerate your sufferings."

"Either way, 's been awhile," he reasons.

"I worked a lot today, and then I went to that open town hall. I'm tired. Tomorrow night I'll take good care of you. I promise."

"Yeah?"

"Pinky promise," she teases.

Carol laughs when Daryl actually holds out his pinky finger. She hooks hers through his and shakes.

"How'd it go?" he asks. "The town hall?"

"Well, Commander Lawson showed up to lodge his objection to my idea of sailing a trade team to Oceanside. He had a little speech prepared about all the dangers that could result from foreign entanglements. And then there was some woman who also lodged a protest, saying if we allow the trade trip, men will start moving to Oceanside to be with the women there, and we'll lose talent and labor and maybe families will be broken up."

"Hell's that mean, families broken up?" Daryl asks.

"I think there are a handful of women who are afraid that their husbands might not be their husbands if they had more options."

"Damn."

"Anyway, the council has scheduled a yes/no vote for August 30 to decide if a team will sail to the November trade fair. Until then, they're going to continue to take public comments at the town halls." If they vote no, she and Daryl will still go, but on horseback. She needs to see that Henry is well and that her Kingdom people have settled in the various camps.

"Think they'll vote yes?" Daryl asks.

"I know I at least have Garland in my corner. Captain Cummins, too. Inola. And Gunther."

"Oh, _Gunther_ , yeah, course," he mutters.

"What's _that_ tone mean?"

"What tone?" he asks.

"Your tone," she insists. "You had a tone."

Daryl rolls onto his back. "Ain't got no tone."

Carol props her head up on her hand, with her elbow on the bed, to face him. He's seemed strangely irritated every time she mentions Gunther, or Gunther stops to talk to her. She wonders if it's jealously. "Daryl," she says gently. "I can't not have friends and allies."

"Never said ya couldn't."

"You don't like Gunther?"

"Like 'em just fine," Daryl grumbles. "Just don't want ya goin' to the movies alone with 'em."

Carol tries to process what seems, to her, to be a complete nonsequiter. "Why would I go to the movies alone with him?"

"Dunno. 'Cause he's yer _friend_. 'N friends go to movies together."

"Daryl, Gunther _is_ my friend, but it would be odd for him to ask me to go _alone_ to a movie with him. If he did, I would be suspicious he was planning on making a move."

"Yeah?"

"Yes. But Gunther is _not_ planning to make a move on me."

"Wouldn't be so sure of that. He likes ya."

"As a friend," Carol says.

A huff of air puffs through Daryl's nostrils. "Yer naïve."

"Well, it's irrelevant if he _is_ attracted to me, because I am _very_ married, and he knows it. And it's not like you couldn't sleep with three dozen different women in this town if you _wanted_ to, you know." She flings herself on her back again.

"Pffft. That's ridiculous."

" _Now_ who's being naïve?" Carol asks.

" _Three dozen?_ Come on! Ain't but six or seven unmarried women my age in this whole damn town, 'n one of em's gay."

"What makes you think you could only bed the ones your age? Or that you couldn't bed any of the married ones?"

"Talkin' like a crazy woman over there."

"Do you really not notice the way women look at you?" She rolls on her side to smirk at him. "Daryl Dixon? Hunter _and_ legend?"

"Stahp."

"Seriously, Daryl, do you never notice?"

"Well…" he murmurs. "Caught Madam Linda oglin' my package once."

A splutter of laughter escapes Carol's lips. Daryl chuckles and then kisses her. When he pulls away, he says, "Only one woman in the whole damn world I wanna bed, 'n she won't let me."

Carol masks her yawn with the back of her hand. "Sorry, Pookie. You'll have to wait until tomorrow night."

[*]

Daryl doesn't have to wait until tomorrow _night_ , because he awakens to the feel of Carol lazily tracing the sinews of the arm he's slung around her. His erection, which threatens to burst from his boxers, presses uncomfortably against the small of her back. "You awake?" she asks.

"Mhmhm. Sorry 'bout the mornin' wood."

"I've been daydreaming." She stops her gentle tracing, turns, and pushes her hand against his shoulder, a sign that she wants him to roll on his back, so he does.

Beneath the thin sheet they sleep under on these warm summer nights, she shimmies out of her panties. Daryl watches the sheet ripple with growing excitement. There are no words exchanged as she unbuttons the flap of his boxers, frees him, and then gently straddles him. But when she eases herself onto him, with a satisfied sigh and a slight gasp, he murmurs, "Mornin', beautiful."

Daryl braces her with a hand on one hip and slides the other down to her bare ass. He kneads as she rocks. Carol lets the pleasure mount slowly, and then chases it with desperate jerks of her hips. He watches her breasts as she moves, bouncing beneath the thin fabric of her white tank top, the hardened nipples making shadows against the cotton. He has to look away so he doesn't lose it too soon. When she cries his name like a plea, and cums all around him, he lets go of his restraint. Daryl flips her on her back, drives in again, and grunts and thrusts his way to a shuddering climax that leaves his body collapsed against hers.

"Daryl," she whispers after a moment. "Could you…"

"Mhmhm." He shifts his weight off of her, leaving only one arm draped over her and a leg between hers. "Sorry. Couldn't think for a second there."

She chuckles and kisses the top of his head.

Later, as they're pulling on their clothes, he says. "Ya know, that wake up call don't get ya out of yer pinky promise for tonight."

[*]

Daryl and Mitch are about to give up on the bear pit. "On the bright side," Mitch says as he yanks up the rope, "at this rate, we'll completely clear these woods of cannibals by winter." The walker's body drags onto the forest floor. Mitch unties the rope and tosses it down for Daryl. "He's fresh. Six months maybe," Mitch continues as Daryl climbs hand over hand. "I'm telling you, these are Williamsburg people. Some escaped and survived a few months before dying in the wilderness."

Daryl crawls out and stands. "Maybe."

"There might still be survivors alive out there. Maybe someone should look for them."

"Be like searchin' for a needle in a haystack," Daryl says.

"You found Sweetheart."

"Had a note to follow. Had tracks, too."

Mitch sighs. "In the old days, before the raid of 5 NE, back when Garland was sheriff instead of mayor, he used to ride with his possee in search of survivors. Now we've just given up on the idea. Sure, if they show up at our gates, or we stumble on them during a scavenging trip, we'll usually take them, but we don't go _looking_ anymore."

"Used to do that, too," Daryl says. "At m'prison camp. And in Alexandria. But that was then."

Mitch takes a knife out to saw at a branch he's having trouble getting off a tree. "What's changed?"

"Ain't shit out there anymore, and even if there was, might be sorry ya found it."

The branch snaps in Mitch's hand. "Are you sorry you found us?"

"Nah," Daryl says. Those few peaceful months at the prison gave him his first taste of home. He made a home of sorts in Alexandria, and then at the Hilltop, for a time. The Kingdom was home in so far as Carol was his home there. But at Jamestown…here, he's _literally_ building a home. "Nah, yer right. 'M glad I did. But…listen, I _know_ where more people are, 'n I _know_ they're peaceful. Oceanside. Hilltop. Alexandria. Ya wanna make the world a bigger place? Don't go chasin' shadows. Go to the next open town hall. Let the council know ya support the trade trip."

"Most people do," Mitch says.

"Yeah, well, the only ones showin' up at the town halls are the ones who wanna bitch 'bout it."

"I'm not much for speaking in front of groups of people."

"Just do it, man."

"All right." Mitch lays a final branch over the pit and sighs nervously. "I'll go to the next one." Dog vanishes, sniffing, into the wood.

"Think he caught scent of a deer." Daryl swings his crossbow from his back, and the men follow the hound. The hunters return to Jamestown in the late afternoon, pulling a field-dressed deer on a drag sled behind them. Dog bounds proudly ahead.

When they're passing the fields, Daryl sees Gunther working among the men and women in the soon-to-be pumpkin patch, giving directions, but also getting his own hands dirty. He's a true _working_ manager, and Daryl has to offer him a bit of grudging respect for that. But when Gunther comes over to the fence post to grab the canteen he's rested there, Daryl can't help but call over, "Got us a deer. Big one. Probably yield 65 pounds."

That's nothing like the 415 pounds of meat Gunther's fat cow ended up giving Jamestown, but Gunther didn't exactly hunt that cow down, didn't follow its trail through a half mile of woods, shoot it himself while it was still running, and then chase its wounded hide another half mile before making the killing shot. He didn't field dress it where it lay and drag it two miles back to Jamestown.

Gunther raises his canteen in Daryl's direction. "Well done!" He takes a swig and returns to the field.

[*]

After the deer is deposited at the butcher, Daryl goes down to the river to bathe. Since every citizen is rationed only one hot shower per week in the museum's employee locker rooms, and sometimes spot washing at a bedside basin or washing trough just isn't enough, there's a spot in the river reserved for bathing – a secluded inlet around a bend masked by a canopy of trees.

There are designated "women only" hours, and once, when she was on patrol, Carol caught a masturbating, peeping tom hiding in the brush with a pair of binoculars. He was mortified by his discovery and asked to plead guilty in exchanged for a waived jury trial, on condition that his behavior not be made public. The judge agreed and fined him two week's worth of tobacco rations, the established penalty for a first conviction of "disorderly conduct," but Carol's got her eye on him, in case he "escalates," as she calls it.

But right now, it's not "women's only" hours and there's no one making use of the water. Daryl strips bare and wades in to scrub himself down with a bar of rough, lime soap, paying special attention to the deer blood that threatens to stain his hands and upper arms.

Once back on shore, he puts on a fresh pair of gray work pants and a sleeveless white undershirt and shoves his filthy, sweaty clothes in his backpack. He steps barefoot into his boots and makes his way back, water dripping from his hair and seeping into the cotton around his neck. When he rounds the bend of the shoreline and hops up the shallow embankment to rejoin the dirt path, two women walking on the path exchange glances and giggle. He thinks maybe his fly is down, so he looks straight down, flushing, but finds the zipper yanked up.

"Hey, Daryl," one of them says. He can't remember their names. He just knows them as the dairy girls. He's often seen them churning milk or butter to be chilled in the Spring House.

"Hey," he grunts in reply.

"Autumn," one of the women says.

"Mhmhm. Yeah. In a couple months."

She laughs. "No. My _name_ is Autumn."

"Oh. Yeah. Knew that." Hell kind of name is _Autumn_? Her parents must have been hippies. She doesn't look old enough to have had hippie parents, though – she's twenty-seven at most.

The other woman, a blonde, is probably ten years older. "Do you remember my name?" she asks, and maybe it's because of what Carol said last night, but he's pretty sure that the tilt of her head and the raise of her eyebrow is meant to be flirtatious.

"Winter," Daryl grunts satirically, and she laughs, and he feels a weird mixture of pride in his accomplishment at getting a pretty woman to laugh and embarrassment at being in his present situation at all.

"It's Cassie." She looks him up and down. "Did you just come from bathing in the river?"

"Mhmhm."

This flirting's probably harmless. They both have wedding bands circling their ring fingers – just like he does - but he doesn't want to encourage them. He turns without another word and walks on ahead up the path, his stride long, but he can feel their eyes on his back, and maybe he walks with a little more pep in his step.

He doesn't turn into the settlement, but keeps walking on to the Indian Village, past a clothesline where shirts and undergarments swing lightly in the hot summer breeze. He finds Dante grilling steaks on the communal grill between two huts. Inola sits nearby snapping green beans into a bucket. "Don't mean to interrupt y'alls super," Daryl says. "Just wanted to see how the door's comin' long."

"Watch the steaks, please?" Dante asks Inola. "Make sure they don't burn."

"Sure thing, Big Bear," she tells him, and Dante leads Daryl around in back of the hut.

"Smells good," Daryl says.

"Well, yeah, it's _steak_. How often do we get that?"

"Ya get to eat venison steak once a month," Daryl says. "Hell, me and Mitch, just got us another deer today."

"I meant a _real_ steak."

Daryl's irritated by his words, but when Dante pulls the tarp off his handiwork, he's immediately distracted from the feeling. "Damn," Daryl murmurs at the intricate, forest image that is taking shape on the front of the unfinished door. "Hell, man, ya got talent."

"In another world, when I retired from my lumberjack job, I would have opened my own little custom furniture shop in some tourist trap of a town. But here…no one wants to pay me to do this. Except you. Why _do_ you?"

"'M buildin' this place for Carol. 'S gonna be rustic for the most part. Ain't 'zactly refined, ya know. But I wanted it to have… _somethin'_. Somethin' special."

"Well, I can carve your shutters, too, if you want."

"I ain't made of tobacco."

Dante chuckles. "The place was looking good last time I walked by. I guess Raul's been helping a lot?"

"Kid's a workhorse. Done with everything now 'cept installin' the manual ceiling fans and the wood stove 'n sandin' the shutters. 'N this. How much longer?"

"Give me three more days."

Daryl nods and Dante flings the tarp back over the half-carved door. Daryl waves to Inola on the way back out, and he runs into the dairy girls again when he reaches the settlement.

"Are you following us?" one of them asks with a smile.

"No, ma'am," Daryl replies. He smiles ever so slightly the rest of the way to the Barron cabin.

When he walks in, Carol is setting the table for dinner while Shannon fries something in a cast iron pan on the wood stove. Garland's rocking a fussy VanDaryl, and Gary sits across from Sweetheart on the floor unsuccessfully trying to teach her to play pattycake.

"What are you smirking about?" Carol asks him.

"Nothin'," Daryl says, and slaps her ass, which causes Carol to jump in surprise and then stand in stunned stillness.

Shannon lets out a whoot of laughter and says, "Looks like somebody had a good day."


	111. Chapter 111

Daryl takes the next day off from hunting. He and Raul sand and stain the shutters and leave them to dry, and then they install the wood stove and put up two manual ceiling fans. Daryl tests out the fans by cranking the pully chains to wind them up and see how long they'll circulate the air. The whirring blades cool them as they work to sand the splinters down on the wooden floor.

"We need those in our cabin. It's so damn hot." Raul crawls forward on his hands and knees and pushes a hand sander back and forth over another spot. "Although I'm going to camp out tonight on the island. Hopefully there's a cool breeze coming off the river."

"Why ya doin' that?"

"My dad asked me to. _Company_ , you know. They can't at her place. She's in that room in the museum with the five other women."

"Ah." Daryl runs his hand over a plank to make sure its smooth before moving to stand another one.

"I think I'm going to fill out an application for one of those rooms in the dorm they're building."

Daryl looks up. "Ya don't like livin' with yer dad?"

"It's fine. But I'm pretty sure he's going to ask Sarah to move in with him eventually. And it's a one-room cabin."

"This is, too. Carol's gonna put up curtains. Make bedrooms. One for us. One for the kid."

"You can still hear things, though," Raul says. "And our place is smaller than this. And, you know…" He smirks. "What if _I_ actually manage to get a girlfriend one day? Turns out Kelly _is_ dating, but only casually. She's gone out with that guard and with some sailor, but she's not going steady with either of them. She doesn't actually have a boyfriend-boyfriend."

"So ya ask 'er out?"

"Not yet. I'm working up to it."

"Gotta man up, kid."

"Yeah? How long did it take you to ask out Carol after you realized you liked her?"

"Well, maybe ya shouldn't be like me," Daryl suggests.

"Who _should_ I be like? Captain Cummins, maybe? _He_ doesn't have any problem with women."

"Nah," Daryl says. "Ya don't wanna be a tomcat."

"A _what_?" Raul laughs. "A _tomcat_? Did you just step out of 1920 or something?"

"'S what m'nana used to call m'daddy. That and _goddamn cheating asshole_. But that one's more modern."

"Why not?" Raul asks. "I mean, tomcats can get most any girl."

"Not for long, though. 'N they don't ever get the best ones."

Raul falls silent as if he's considering this bit of advice. They each sand several more planks in silence, and then Raul says, "Do you ever miss your mom?"

Daryl's arm freezes in mid thrust of his sander. It's a strange question. He begins sanding again, slowly. "M'mom died when I's a boy."

"So did mine. I was twelve. She got the pestilence and transformed."

Daryl forgets, sometimes, how many people came of age in this world.

"My dad left us a rifle when he went away to teach at the academy," Raul continues. "For protection. He started taking me to the range when I was nine. Mom didn't like guns, so I was supposed to use it, you know, in case someone broke into the house or something. To protect her. I was supposed to use it to _protect_ her. But that's not what I used it for."

"Yeah. Ya did. Protected her from livin' like that. Set 'er free."

"Yeah," Raul says quietly. "I guess." He begins sanding more roughly.

[*]

The next day, Daryl gets up before the sun, hunts until noon, chows down on some deer jerky and fresh fruit, and then asks Raul to help him install the now dry shutters. They get the shutters in place and then add the latches.

"Screw," Daryl mutters, and Raul hands him one. "Hold this latch still."

Raul holds the shutter's latch in place while Daryl screws one side into the wood. "So…I did it," Raul says.

"Did what?"

"Asked Kelly out."

"Yeah? And?" Daryl opens and closes the shutter and tests the latch to make sure it secures the wood shut.

"She said yes to a movie Friday night, and a walk afterward. You know, to look at the stars."

"Mhmh. Good." Daryl walks over to another shutter.

Raul follows to hold the latch. "Should I bring her flowers? Or would that seem, you know…desperate?"

Daryl's only brought Carol flowers a few times. There was never anything desperate about it. Well, maybe that first time. He _was_ desperate then. Desperate to get her to stop _crying_. And she _did_ stop crying when he clunked that beer bottle down on the counter in Dale's RV and told her the story of the Cherokee Rose. At least for a little while. "Can't hurt I guess."

When they're done screwing in the last latch, Daryl says, "Well, 's it. Yer work is done, kid."

"There's still the door to install, whenever it's done."

"Dante's gonna help me with that."

"Well, but…." Raul looks around the finished cabin. "How about a counter? We could build a counter over there for the kitchen nook."

"Got one from Home Depot already."

"An awning?" Raul suggests. "Out front? Or out back? We could install a wood awning so you can sit out there in the evening and have some shade."

"Don't need an awnin'."

"Okay," Raul says quietly. He looks strangely upset.

Daryl's been paying him for his help. Maybe that's the problem. "Look, kid, if yer worried 'bout not havin' the extra tobacco to trade, ya know ya can always work extra hours in the fields or guttin' fish. They'll give ya extra rations."

"I know. It's not that," Raul says. "It's just…I just…I like hanging out with you, is all. You're cool. Easy to talk to."

"Oh." That was not a possibility that had occurred to Daryl. "Well, I'll be 'round." It sounds callous to him after he says it, like a girl brushing off a guy who has a desperate crush on her.

"Yeah. Me, too," Raul says and then busies himself packing the screwdriver and extra screws in Daryl's toolbox.

"Hey, uh," Daryl ventures, "if ya ain't got to get to work right away, how 'bout we go to the tavern? Get us a drink to celebrate finsihin' all this? On me."

Raul smiles. "Yeah. Yeah. That'd be good."

The tavern's mostly empty when they get there, and the cauldron of soup is no longer on the fire, but the sign has not yet been turned to _Closed_ for the break between lunch and dinner. When they walk in, the floorboards creaking beneath their feet, Madam Linda, who is sitting at the end of the bar and playing chess with Gunther, looks up. "Candy!" she shouts. "Customers!"

The chairs are all up on the tables, so they take a seat at the bar, not far from Linda and Gunther.

There's a rustling in the loft, and Candy makes her way down the ladder. "Hey, boys," she says as she walks behind the bar. "I was just expanding my digs. Now that Trisha's moved in with Andrew, I get to take down the divider and add her room to mine. Leaves more space for gentlemen callers." She winks at Raul, who flushes.

"Leave the poor boy alone," Madam Linda tells her.

"You let her have gentleman callers in the tavern?" Gunther asks skeptically.

"I'm _not_ running a brothel," Madam Linda insists. "But Candy's a grown woman who can make her own life decisions."

"Thank you," Candy says.

"I didn't say you could make them _well_ ," Madam Linda clarifies. "And I'd prefer you made wiser ones."

Candy rolls her eyes and turns her attention to Raul. "What can I get you, honey? We have some dandelion wine this week, if you're interested in that. It's on special. Only _one_ bullet for a glass."

"Because it's _terrible_ ," Gunther says as he moves a black chess piece. "Don't let her sell you on it."

"Damnit, Gunther, why can't your day off be a day _I_ don't work?" Candy asks.

"Well what would be the fun of that? How could I get on your nerves from such a distance?"

"I swear, Gunther, one of these days." Candy tilts her head at Raul. "So the wine then?"

"Uh…" Raul looks at Daryl. "I guess if it's chea – "

"- Pint of Jamestown brew," Daryl interrupts. "Both of us."

Candy grabs two pint glasses from behind the bar while Linda tells Gunther, "You know, _I_ _also_ would appreciate it if you wouldn't try to downsell my customers on the wine. I still have three bottles of it."

"Well, there's a reason for that, isn't there?" Gunther replies. "You shouldn't have let George talk you into stocking it. But I'll take them all off your hands if they're still here at the end of the night. My private tobacco garden is doing _quite_ well."

"You need to stop drinking so much." Madam Linda moves a white chess piece. "Dr. Ahmad told me what your blood pressure was the last time you went in."

"That sounds like a HIPAA violation." Gunther moves a black piece. "Check."

"There are no privacy laws in a small town." Madam Linda moves out of check. "And I'm serious. I worry about you. You think you don't have a problem just because you're never late to work, and you do a good job, and you never black out, and you never do anything mean or stupid when you're drunk, and you can afford your habit."

Candy laughs as she sets down the pint glasses in front of Daryl and Raul. "So what's the problem then?"

"The _problem_ is that he's slowly and silently killing himself!" Linda exclaims. "So are you, probably, though not so _silently_."

"You're not my mother," Candy shoots back. "And you're not Gunther's, either, though you're _old_ enough to be." She struts to the far end of the bar, where she begins putting up the stools.

"Hardly," Linda mutters. "I couldn't be his mother unless I had him when I was only fifteen."

"My mom had me when she was seventeen," Raul says. When Madam Linda shoots him a cool look, he immediately realizes his mistake. "But that's…you know. That's unusual in this day and age. Or _was_ , I mean, in _that_ day and age. Maybe not in _this_ day and age. I mean, because we don't have much in the way of birth…uhmmm…nevermind."

"My mama had me at seventeen, too," Daryl says to ease the young man's embarrassment.

"Well," Madam Linda says, roughly moving a piece on the chess board. "My mother was _forty_ when she had me. Check."

"We have a lot in common," Raul tells Daryl.

He must mean they both had young mothers and lost them young.

"'Cept ya got a good daddy," Daryl tells him. "'N mine was shit."

"I wish he hadn't gone to teach at the academy, though. Maybe my mom would still be alive, if he hadn't taken the promotion. If he'd stayed in Texas."

"Can't blame 'em for that," Daryl murmurs.

"If _I_ hadn't wanted to finish middle school in Texas, we could have moved with him. Maybe she wouldn't have caught it."

"Can't blame yerself for that neither," Daryl insists. He thinks of all the things he's blamed himself for over the years – Beth, Glenn, Abraham. "Least, ya _shouldn't_. Don't do no damn good."

Raul nods and sips his pint, while Madam Linda takes her next turn and announces, "Check mate."

Gunther cranes his neck to look at the board. "You're a sneaky one." He stands, pushes back his stool, and runs a hand through his thick hair. He plucks his straw hat off the bar and settles it on his head. "I suppose I'll be back at dinner time. Shall we have a rematch then?"

"If we're not too busy," Madam Linda says. "What are you doing for the rest of your afternoon? Not drinking, I hope?"

"There's another one of those open town halls." He glances at Daryl. "Carol will be there. She always is."

"Mhmhm." Daryl eyes him warily. What, did Gunther think he didn't _know_ that? He knows where his wife is. Some of the time.

"We're taking public opinion on the trade trip until the vote," Gunther tells Madam Linda, "and people have also been showing up to protest the rent we set for the new dorm rooms. They either think it's too high – if they want to live there – or too low – if they already have their own place."

"When's that dorm going to be finished?" Raul asks.

"Hard to say. These things take time. Months."

"Do you think I have a chance of getting a room? I heard a lot of people want them."

"If there are too many applications, rooms will be allotted based on who's been here the longest."

Raul's shoulders fall.

"But I'm sure there will be a waiting list," Gunther tells him. "People do move in with each other sometimes, and that could free up a room."

When Gunther's gone, Madam Linda clears the chess board to somewhere behind the bar and leaves Daryl and Raul to finish their pints. They make quick work of them, because it's clear the place is shutting down.

[*]

The next morning, Daryl and Mitch find a wild boar in their bear pit. It's still alive and trying to climb out, but the stone walls Inola built keep it from gaining traction. Daryl makes quick work of it by slitting its throat, and then the hunters haul it out.

"At least it's _something_ ," Mitch says as they hang the boar from a nearby tree for field dressing.

"Yeah, but people're gonna complain 's gamey compared to the pigs Gunther's raisin'." Daryl draws his hunting knife.

"Man, what's your issue with Gunther?"

"Nothin'." Daryl cuts two long lines from the boar's head to its tail. "Just think he has the hots for m'wife." He begins to skin the animal.

Mitch chuckles as he starts to recover the bear pit. "You know, if Garland bumped chests with every man who had the hots for Shannon, he'd have a giant callus from neck to naval."

"I ain't bumpin' chests with no one."

"You are," Mitch insists. "A little bit. And why? You've already won. You got the girl."

"Just don't like it," Daryl growls as he makes more cuts and finishes skinning the hog.

"He can't help it if he likes her," Mitch reasons. "He hasn't made a move, has he?"

"Not that I know of."

"You can use my folding woodsman saw to cut off the head," Mitch tells him.  
"It's in my pack. I'd leave the organs in, though, and let the butcher deal with it. We don't want anything dangerous to leech out."

"Think I can manage that," Daryl grumbles.

"See?" Mitch says. "Chest bumping. It's the butcher's _job_. He's good at it. Better than you. And boars are tricky when it comes to the organs."

"Fine. I'll leave the damn organs in. Could do it if I _had_ to though." As Daryl unfolds the saw, he mutters, "Bet Gunther couldn't butcher that cow if he had to. He could only milk it."

"So he's good with tits, is that's what you're saying?"

"Shut up."

Mitch laughs.

When they're done with the pit and the boar is field dressed, they drag it back toward Jamestown. Dog chases a cicada along the way, sniffing and then pouncing and then whining when it buzzes off.

"How's the bear skin rug coming along?" Mitch asks.

Daryl tanned the hide himself, but he paid Inola to do the stitching. "'S ready. Gonna lay it down 'fore I show Carol the cabin. Right in front of the fireplace."

"You're not leaving the head on, are you?"

"'Course."

"Carol's not going to like that," Mitch warns him.

"Ya don't know Carol."

"I know women don't like heads on their rugs," Mitch replies. "I mean, imagine making love on that thing, with the flames of the fireplace gently illuminating the room, the romantic crackling – and then you look up at a set of growling teeth."

"Head faces the other way."

"All right, then at a pair of ears."

Daryl whistles to Dog, who has wandered off in pursuit of the cicada. The canine returns to his side.

" _Trust_ me on this one."

"Why? Ya got a lot of experience fuckin' women on bearskin rugs?" Daryl asks.

"Don't say I didn't warn you."

"Pfft." But that evening, when he goes to check on the now almost-finished door, Daryl asks Inola, "Can ya take the head off the rug? Or is it too late? Will it fuck it up?"

She assures him she can detach it and smooth out that edge. "You might lose an inch or two of rug, but that's it."

"A'ight. Do it."

When Daryl gets back to the Barron cabin that evening, the scent of venison sausage wafts from the wood stove. Sweetheart is sitting on the floor and slobbering all over her plastic keys. Daryl didn't think his heart could ever thud harder against the cage of his chest than it did the first time Carol said she loved him. But then Sweetheart sees him, squeals in recognition, drops her keys, and throws herself forward on her hands and knees. This time, she doesn't just rock. Instead, she tries to crawl toward him – hand, hand, knee, hand, knee, hand. He thinks maybe his breastbone is about to snap in two. Hand, knee, knee, hand – Sweetheart tumbles forward, face first onto the floor, and wails.

"Shhhhh!" Daryl hastens forward to pluck her up and cuddle her against his chest. "Daddy's here."


	112. Chapter 112

Carol doesn't tell Daryl that Sweetheart crawled a few paces in the afternoon while he was busy working on the cabin. She lets him believe his little girl crawled, for the very first time, to him.

As she makes her patrol rounds the next afternoon, she wonders if they're going to have to babyproof the new cabin. She tries to remember what they all did with Judith in the early days and realizes they didn't much care. When there are walkers and one-eyed maniacs and Saviors at your heels, sharp edges suddenly become less of a concern. They're settled now, though, and she has the luxury to think about mundane things such as - how many splinters is Sweetheart going to get crawling on a wooden floor?

Carol finishes off her patrol by walking along the shoreline where the river bends and an inlet is formed beneath a canopy of trees. They call it "the bathhouse." A few women are bathing and talking and laughing together in the four-foot deep water. She takes a swing behind the tree line to make sure that disgusting peeping tom has not returned.

Carol was livid when she found that man, but when she told the story to Daryl, he was deathly quiet. When she asked him why, he admitted, quietly, "Peeped on y'all once in the lake, back at the Atlanta camp. Not on purpose! Was just out huntin' 'n I heard y'all, so, went to see what the noise was. Didn't watch long. I swear."

"Well…that isn't the _same_. I caught this man with his pants down around his ankles. And a pair of _binoculars_. And his dick in his hand. It was _gross._ " She turned her head to look at him. "You weren't watching _me_ , were you?"

Daryl looked away.

He wouldn't have been able to see much if he had. She always went in with a tank top on, to hide the cigarette burns on her back and the bruises on her ribcage. "Not back then," Carol said assuredly. "You were looking at Andrea maybe."

"Nah. That was Merle."

" _Merle_ was watching, too?"

"I left," Daryl said defensively. "Two minutes in, I turned and left. Four minutes maybe."

"And Merle?" Carol asked.

Daryl shrugged. "Merle was Merle. He stayed 'n had a smoke."

But today, there is no peeping tom in the brush. Carol makes her way around the bend and up the shallow embankment to the dirt path. She walks past the pumpkin patch where Gunther is taking a break from his work to drain a glass of lemonade Madam Linda has brought him. He wipes the back of his mouth with his tanned arm and hollers, "Hey, Carol!"

She waves and Linda cranes back her neck to look at her and then turns again to talk with Gunther, who gradually returns his attention to the tavern manager.

Carol walks on and is nearing the fort when Daryl comes strutting in her direction. "Hey, there," she says. "Something wrong?" He's walking quickly.

"Nah. Just lookin' for ya. Ya still on patrol?"

"Off in two minutes. Why?"

He jerks his head up toward the fort. "Got something to show ya."

She walks shoulder to shoulder with him through the worn wooden fence that surrounds the settlement and past a barn and a few cabins to the building site. Her heart quickens with excitement with each step. She knows what's coming. Daryl asked her three weeks ago not to "peek" at the cabin until he's done, and she hasn't. She hasn't put her head inside the open windows or lifted the tarp that covers the open doorway, but she can't help but see it from the outside when she walks by, the logs carefully arrayed to form the four walls and roof, standing proud amidst the wattle and daub cabins that surround it.

As they grow closer, Daryl seizes her hand and tugs. He comes to a stop outside the front door, and Carol's mouth drops open. The wood has been beautiful stained a golden brown, which stands out against the gray-brown logs of the cabin walls around it. In the intricate carving across the door's surface, a tree grows, stretching its branches toward a setting sun. A field of artful, slender grass lies beneath the tree, and from it springs up blooming wildflowers, out of which peeks the eyes of a gentle doe. The work is delicate, detailed, and lifelike.

"Ya like it?" Daryl asks.

"I _love_ it. How - "

"- Dante made it. Had to give 'em some of m'ammo, 'n I promised to bag him 'n 'Nola a wild turkey off the clock."

"It's gorgeous!"

"Saw ya liked that rockin' chair he carved, so…" Daryl shrugs. "Figured ya might like it."

"I _love_ it," she repeats. She may have been a Queen in the Kingdom, but she thinks this is the most royal thing she's ever owned. "Is it all done inside?"

"Mhmhm."

"Can I see it?" She reaches for the door handle, which is made from a deer's antler, and Daryl puts a hand over hers to stop her from opening it.

"Hold on. Step back."

Puzzled, and a little excited, Carol does. Daryl opens the door but doesn't step in yet. "Know ya like yer traditions."

"What?" she asks.

"Gotta carry ya over the threshold, right?"

Before she can answer, Carol is hooked under her knees and swept up in Daryl's arms. He turns sideways to carry her in, but still manages to bump her head slightly on the door frame.

"Fuck!" he curses. "Sorry."

She laughs as he sets her on her feet inside.

"I fucked it up. 'M Sorry."

"No, you didn't," she reassures him as she rubs the back of her head. "It's a tiny bump." Carol looks around the cabin. Daryl must have wound up the manual ceiling fans before coming to fetch her, because they're whirring rhythmically. "It's not hot in here!" August is brutal in Virginia, and the Barron cabin often feels hot, even with the fans running. But Daryl's used fans with bigger blades, and positioned them better, and he has more windows in the cabin. The shutters are all thrown open, except for those over the window nearest the door, which she can see are stained the same golden brown as the door.

She walks to the kitchen nook and runs her hand over the wooden stove and then the short counter they picked out from Home Depot. The place is barren of any other furniture, but she gets to do all that – position the furniture, put up the room dividing curtains, and decorate the place.

Carol looks down at the smooth, wood planks beneath her feet. "It's all so beautiful."

"Ain't big," he says.

"Plenty big enough for three people." She walks over to the fireplace next and examines the stonework on the hearth and chimney. "Inola's really talented, isn't she?"

"Mhmhm."

She realizes she's stepping on something and steps back onto the wood. She crouches down and runs a hand over the soft surface of the bear skin rug. "Is this from the bear you caught?"

"Yeah."

"Where's the head?"

"Well…took it off."

"Oh." Carol stands.

"Ya didn't want the head on, did ya?"

Carol shrugs. "I don't care either way. It's just how I picture bearskin rugs when I think of them. With a big fierce growling bear head on it."

"Fuuuuck…'M gonna kick Mitch's ass."

Carol laughs. "What?"

"Told me to take the head off. That ya wouldn't like it."

"Don't kick his ass. In the long run, this is probably better." She smiles at him. "Shall we christen the cabin?"

"That one of them traditions you like?"

"Could be," she says with a suggestive tilt of her head.

"Ain't got no bubly."

"That's not what I mean by christening it." She nods to the bear skin rug.

It takes Daryl another second to finally understand what she's implying, but once he does, his lips come crashing down on hers, and it's not long before he has her stripped bare on the bearskin rug.

They don't move in that night – the sun has begun to set by the time they're lovemaking has exhausted them, and Carol needs time to make the place a home. They spend one final night in the Barron family cabin, playing cards, laughing, and drinking with Shannon and Garland after the little ones are put to bed. Their playful chortles wake Gary once and VanDaryl twice, but Sweetheart sleeps through it all like a champion.

[*]

After Raul and Dante set down the couch, Carol tells them to move it slightly. And then slightly again. And again.

"Jesus, Carol!" Dante exclaims. "It's fine where it is."

"I just want it _lined_ up with the rug."

Dante looks at Raul. "Inola was like this with my things when I moved in. Stay a bachelor, young lad."

"It may be my only choice," Raul says with a smile and a shrug. Carol's pleased to see the young man seems fairly relaxed around Dante. She credits his budding friendship with Daryl for his greater ease around men in general, though there are still those from which he keeps his distance. She sees it, sometimes, the way his footsteps abruptly switch course when he nears a group of laughing or talking men, and how he veers in some other direction. She hopes the psychologist Santiago is paying with half his weekly rations of ammo is helping, too.

"Aw, don't let the odds get you down," Dante says. "I hear there might be a trade trip to an island full of beautiful women coming up."

"The vote's not until August 31," Carol tells him, "but if you think it's a good idea, you might go to one of the open town halls to offer your support."

"I think I'd rather stick a fork in my eye than sit through one of those," Dante admits.

"You can always leave after you offer your support," she tells him. "Please? There's been a lot of people coming to complain about it. I think more people support it than not, they just aren't showing up."

"I'll support it, Carol," Raul says. "I was going to go to the next one anyway, to make a job change application. I'll say something in favor."

"Thank you," Carol assures him. "I appreciate that."

As they're all heading for the door to go get more furniture from the storehouse, Raul asks, "Is Daryl going to be here to help soon?"

"He's hunting," Carol tells him. "He doesn't want anything to do with this part of it."

"Oh."

Carol hears the disappointment in Raul's voice. He was clearly hoping to be working with Daryl, not _her_. "You know," she says, "after we're settled in, Daryl and I really should have you over for dinner sometime. Maybe you two could play some cards."

Raul grins at the floor.

[*]

"Could of left the damn head on," Daryl grumbles as he scans the sign on the forest floor. The bear pit was completely empty today, no walkers even. "Carol didn't care."

"Do you really want Sweetheart playing with those teeth?" Mitch ask.

"Ya know, she crawled the other day. Right to me!"

"Yes, I know. You've told me three times now." Mitch stoops, brushes some debris aside, and looks at the print. "Shit! It's human."

"Walker?"

"No, _human_."

Daryl abruptly kneels beside him to look, and his thudding heart stills. "'S just Barry's." Daryl points to an emblem on the boot print that has sunk into the mud. "'S got those Wolverine boots."

"Well these are our hunting grounds!" Mitch exclaims as he stands again. "He should stick to his own."

"Who's bumpin' chests now?" Daryl asks as he stands. "We weren't huntin' day 'fore yesterday anyhow." It was their day off. " 'N he came back with a shit ton of ring-neck pheasant. So who cares?"

"Probably chased off all the deer with that damn noisy shotgun of his," Mitch grumbles as he walks on.

Daryl shakes his head. As they search for other tracks, Dog, sniffing the ground, finds the butt end of a rolled cigarette.

"And look at this!" Mitch cries. "He just littered all over _our_ hunting grounds."

"What's yer beef with Barry, man?" Daryl neither likes nor dislikes the man, but he respects his skill as a hunter, if not his skill as a father to that girl who dicked Raul around for a while.

"He used to call me a fag and snicker about it with his buddies all the time. We got in a fight, and scrappy as I am, I won. Because I was _mad_. He left me alone after that. But it's because of guys like him James won't come out, and we have to sneak around."

Dog's caught scent of something. Daryl follows. "Thought ya weren't sneaking 'round no more. Thought ya was done with the lieutenant."

"Well, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak."

"Didn't know Barry was such an asshole," Daryl mutters. "Wouldn't of voted for 'em."

"You _voted_ for him?" Mitch asks in disbelief.

"Thought we needed a hunter on Council."

"Well, we could have had one if you hadn't scratched your name off the ballot."

Dog freezes and his ears perk up. The hunters fall silent. Dog barks three times, loudly, and twigs crunch and snap on the forest floor as a doe and two fawn emerge suddenly from among some trees and flee from the sound. Daryl instinctively raises his bow, and Mitch his rifle, but then they pause, weapons mid-air and let the mother and babies flee. Dog, not understanding why his discovery has not been rewarded, whines.

"'S all right, boy," Daryl tells him. "Now find us the buck."

They stay out all day hunting, in part because it takes a long time to bag the buck, and in part because Daryl doesn't want to get back too early and be asked to help decorate or arrange furniture.

"You sure are dragging your feet," Mitch says as they make their way back to the gates, pulling the drag sled behind them.


	113. Chapter 113

When Daryl opens the door to the cabin, for a fleeting second he thinks he got the wrong one. He almost takes a step back outside to double check the door. The place has been transformed from a barren box of wood into a _home_.

Two of their more attractive wood rifles hang over the mantle, resting in metal claps, but Carol's AR-15 is nowhere in sight. Their belongings, which he left piled on the floor this morning, have vanished, tucked away perhaps in the pull-out baskets under the couch in the living area or the single tall dresser in the bedroom nook, which Daryl can see through the open, heavy drapes. The neatly made-up double mattress sits in the frame he and Dante built two weeks ago, one with two drawers underneath for additional storage. Beside the bed, a white ceramic pitcher with a blue floral pattern rests on the bottom shelf of a basin stand, with a matching bowl on the top shelf, while fresh washscloths hang off the handles on either side. A circular mirror is affixed from an extension of the stand above the bowl. He doesn't remember her snagging that old-school relic.

Sweetheart sits upright in her crib in the second bedroom nook, chewing on the thick edges of a board book. A rocking chair rests angled toward her crib, and against the wall rises a wooden bookcase, the shelves neatly stacked with carefully folded cloth diapers, burp cloths, baby clothes, toys, baby bottles, and books. When Sweetheart sees him, she drops her book and begins to bounce in place on her bottom. She leans forward and grabs the slats of the crib and tries, but fails, to pull herself up.

Carol turns from watering the herbs in a window box and says, "Welcome home."

Daryl drops his pack and crossbow on the floor and comes to pluck the now squealing baby from the crib. He puts Sweetheart on his hip, kisses Carol on the cheek, and says, "Looks real nice."

Carol looks down on the wooden planks of the floor, and it's only then that he realizes he's tracked mud all the way from the door to the crib and from the crib to the window. "Sorry."

She smiles. "Next time, can you use the scraper mat outside and then take your boots off by the door?"

"Mhmhm." He didn't notice the mat outside, but he notices the interior one now, just inside the door, a rectangle with thick, brown threads and the words _Home Sweet Home._

"And there's a hook for your crossbow on the back of the door." Carol sets down the watering can and walks over to the things he's shrugged off in the entryway. She plucks up his bow and hangs it on the door. "It's high enough up that Sweetheart shouldn't be able to reach it until she's old enough to know better." She plucks up his pack and brings it over to their bedroom nook and plops it on top of the dresser. "You can put your handgun and knives in the chest at the foot of our bed when you take them off. I have my weapons in there. It locks for when she starts getting into things."

"Mhmhm."

"It doesn't feel too crowded, does it? I tried to tuck things away and situate the furniture to allow more open space."

"Looks great." Sweetheart flops in his grip, craning her neck as if she's trying to do a backward sommersault to escape, so he shifts her from his hip to a two-armed cradle against his chest. She gurgles and then lays her head sleepily on his shoulder.

"I think the place looks better when we leave the drapes open like this, but whenever we need privacy…" Carol begins to pull one of the drapes closed across their bedroom nook. She does the same with a second drape, blocking off their bedroom from Sweetheart's. The walls of the cabin make the other two walls of the bedrooms. "It's not sound proof, of course," she says as she opens them again, "but it does dull the sound a little, and they're pretty thick – there's no seeing through them."

"Yeah. Like it. Got walls when ya need 'em, but not when ya don't. What smells so damn good?" He nods to the herb box just outside the open window. "That stuff?"

"It's probably the basil plant on the kitchen table you're smelling. Gunther brought it for us."

Daryl walks over to the kitchen on the opposite side of the cabin, near the front door. Copper pots and cast iron pans hang from a rack installed above the wood stove. A hutch rests against the wall, most of the contents tucked away behind closed cabinets, and in front of it stands the kitchen table. Basil abundantly fills the small, red-brown ceramic pot resting at its center.

Gunther brought his wife a plant? Hell, he might as well have brought her flowers. "For _us_?" he asks suspiciously.

"Yes, for _us_ ," she says curtly.

"Then why'd he bring it when I wasn't here?"

"Well, he didn't _know_ you weren't here."

"How long he stay?"

"About fifteen minutes. I made him a cup of tea." She smirks. "And then he bent me over the kitchen counter and fucked me from behind."

"That ain't funny!" Daryl covers one of Sweetheart's ears with his hand, the one that isn't already against his shoulder. "'N watch yer language 'round the baby!"

Carol shakes her head.

Daryl notices that she's hung some things on the wall in the kitchen nook – wooden cookie cutters, two sconces for candles, and a small painting with a bottle of wine and two half empty wine glasses. He's never seen that painting before. She didn't pick it up on one of their scavenging trips. "Where'd the paintin' come from?"

"Earl and Ana gave it to us. It's nice. I like it. It really works well there. Shannon and Garland gave us the herbs I put in the window box. Parsley, sage, and rosemary. And that area rug came from Inola and Dante." She points to a small, handwoven, circular rug in front of the rocking chair in Sweetheart's bedroom nook. "The basin stand and the pitcher and wash basin were from Santiago and Sarah. They looted it from some historic house when they went scavenging for building materials for the dorm."

Daryl's confused when he hears about all these gifts. He thought maybe Gunther was making a move on his wife with the whole gift-giving thing, but apparently he wasn't the only one to stop by with a gift? Other people did it too? "Why's everyone givin' us shit?"

"It's what friends do, sometimes, when you move into your first real house. They're housewarming gifts."

"Housewarmin'?"

"You've never heard of a housewarming gift?"

"Well, when my mama burned our cabin down, a neighbor brought me some hand-me-down clothes from one of his kids." All of Daryl's clothes went up in flames, not that he had many to start with. The generous neighbor lived almost a block away. He brought Daryl more clothes than he'd ever owned in his life, and then said he was sorry it wasn't much.

"Yeah," Carol replies, "that's not exactly a housewarming gift. Daryl, this jealousy thing, with Gunther, I don't like it."

"Didn't realize other people was bringin' shit is all," he mutters.

"Even if it _was_ just him, so what? Would it bother you if just Garland brought me something? Or just Dante? Or just Santiago?"

"Nah. 'Cause they got women."

"Raul?"

"Nah, 'cause he's a third your age."

"I'm not sixty-three, Daryl. I'm fifty-two."

"Ya knew what I meant."

"Half my age would have been a safer estimate. Just for future reference."

"Mhmhm. Noted." He kisses the top of Sweetheart's head. "'S for dinner?"

"I decorated and moved furniture all day. What makes you think _I'm_ cooking?"

"Uhh…"

"I'll make venison stew. With potatoes and carrots. Bring Sweetheart over to Shannon to nurse, and by the time you get back, it'll be ready."

Daryl nods, bounces Sweetheart a little in his arms, and heads for the front door. He turns back slightly before opening it. "Ya still gonna be mad at me when I get back?"

"Probably not. Especially not if you trade Garland something for one of those oatmeal cookies he got from Mrs. Merriweather."

He returns an hour later with _two_ cookies.

[*]

Carol may have been Queen of the Kingdom, but here's she's mistress of her own castle, amazed by all the little details that go into running a small household. She has to make sure someone's home Monday morning for the iceman, who delivers a block of frozen ice chipped from Jamestown's ice house, which goes in their 72-qurart Igloo Cooler. Then the milkman comes on Monday evening, leaving them four, one-quart glass milk bottles. Those go straight into the cooler, as does the meat, which comes folded in brown butcher's paper on Tuesday morning. The composter comes on Thursday evenings to collect any food scraps or other compostable materials from a crate out back, while the recycler comes on Fridays for empty mason jars and tin cans. The trashman picks up all other un-reusable rubbish on Saturday mornings, and takes it to the trench outside the gates for burning.

Today is Sunday, however, which means Carol has to rinse out the now empty milk bottles and leave them outside the front door for collection and refill. When she comes back inside, Daryl has just finished wrestling Sweetheart into a fresh cloth diaper and is attempting to pin it.

Daryl is fairly traditional in his expectations when it comes to domestic duties, not entirely unlike Ed, but the difference is that when _directly_ asked to do something, he will always do it. Sometimes with grumbling, but he'll always do it. Carol, however, is content with handling most of the domestic duties herself. Daryl _will_ do things if asked, but rarely to her _satisfaction_. His threshold of tolerance for dirt and disorder far exceeds hers. She doesn't trust him with either the dishes or the laundry, and his cooking, while safe and nutritious, is bland. He can't mend clothes worth a damn, and his idea of sweeping is to sweep into the corners and leave it there. So she does those chores and leaves him to do the cabin repairs, to sharpen the knives, to clean the guns (he _does_ care about how dirty _they_ are), and to work extra hours to store up extra rations.

"Fuck!" Daryl mutters now as he pricks himself with a safety pin. Carol raises an eyebrow but does not offer to assist. She slides down onto the couch, and eventually Daryl brings the diapered, shirtless baby over and plops her on the bearskin run. Dog raises his head to find his throne invaded, but he only licks the interloper, who squeals and giggles.

Daryl goes to crank the ceiling fan in the center of the cabin, and by the time he does, Sweetheart has crawled all the way around the couch and now sits at his feet. "Hey," he says, "How'd ya get here?"

Carol flings an arm across the back of the couch and turns toward him. "She's becoming _very_ mobile. We're going to have to watch her like a hawk."

Daryl leans down, scoops the baby up, and comes to sit beside Carol on the couch with Sweetheart on his lap. He looks at the unlit fireplace as a breeze from the fan's baldes beats down upon them. "Need a TV."


	114. Chapter 114

Carol has attended every open town hall this month to promote her trade trip idea. This is the _last_ one before the council's August 31 vote. Twenty-six folding chairs, lined in two rows, face the council table, but only ten are filled. She takes a seat next to Mitch in the front row. He nods a greeting.

Daryl told her two weeks ago that Mitch was going to speak on behalf of her idea, but this is the first time she's actually _seen_ him at a meeting. Carol thought he had forgotten his promise, or perhaps made it insincerely to appease Daryl. She's glad to see an ally in these chairs, and he's not the only one. Raul sits in the row behind her, and, next to him, Sarah. Sheriff Earl is here, too, at the end of the first row, but Carol's not sure for what purpose. He looks _tense_ , almost angry.

Behind the long council table, Garland checks his watch. "This town hall is now open for public comment. Please raise your hand and wait to be called upon." _That_ woman raises her hand again. The one who thinks her husband is going to leave her if they make contact with Oceanside. "Henrietta," Garland says, "do you have anything _additional_ to add that you haven't already said? Because if this is just a repeat of what you said the last two times, your opinion has already been recorded."

Henrietta stands. "What if the ship breaks down on the way to Oceanside? Did you ever think of that? Dozens of people stranded. They'll be devoured by cannibals."

"The ships are well maintained," Lieutenant Witherspoon says from behind the table. "In our fishing expeditions, we often sail up to ten – "

"- Lieutenant," Garland interrupts, "we're here to solicit public opinion on the issue, not to influence it. Save those arguments for the closed-door deliberations we'll have before the vote."

"Oh, sorry," the young officer murmurs with embarrassment. His eyes flit to Mitch and then away. "I'm still getting used to all the procedures."

When the woman sits down, Garland scans the newly raised hands. "Raul?"

Santiago's son stands. "I support the trade trip. I think it's a great idea. There's strength in allies. If Williamsburg had allies, maybe those of us who were scattered would have had somewhere to go when our camp was overrun, and not so many people would have wandered and died." Raul pauses. "I had something else to address, too?"

"Yes," Garland says. "Proceed."

"I want to apply to the council for a job assignment. I want to work on the new dormitory. I'm good at construction. I helped Mr. Dixon build his cabin, but he's not going to need me anymore."

Garland glances down the table at his fellow councilmen as if inviting comment.

Dr. Ahmad speaks. "I don't think a job reassignment is a good idea. You were apprenticed to your apothecary in Williamsburg, and your skills in that area exceed those of anyone in Jamestown. But builders are a dime a dozen."

"Thanks, Ibrahim," says Inola, jerking her head in the doctor's direction. "We _could_ use the help on the dormitory. People are anxious to see it built."

"I'm sure people are anxious to get well when they get sick, too," Dr. Carolyn Taylor replies. "And as a veterinarian, I use Raul's concoctions for the animals as well. They're superior to what we were using before. I agree with Dr. Ahmad. He shouldn't be reassigned."

Gunther leans forward on the table. "He does his twenty by working ten hours as an apothecary and ten in the fields. The fall harvest is only a month away. I don't think he should be taken from the fields either."

"I'm not _asking_ to be reassigned," Raul clarifies. "I could do all three jobs. Ten hours as an apothecary, ten in the fields, and twenty as a builder."

Surprised whispering flows back and forth behind the council table. Few people request to work more than thirty hours, unless they're supporting spouses or elderly parents or children with their rations. In a technology-barren, frontier-style world, people need more time for domestic work. It's not just a matter of time, however, but of physical exhaustion.

"How about ten hours as an apothecary, fifteen as a builder, and fifteen in the fields?" Gunther suggests to the council.

"Why should you get five extra hours out of him?" Inola asks.

"Harvest is coming."

"Well why not ten as an apothecary, ten as a builder, ten in the fields, and ten cleaning fish?" Captain Cummins asks. "Then _no one_ gets more than ten hours out of him."

"You don't need more fish cleaners!" Inola insists.

"We absolutely do! September is one of the most abundant months, and we have to seize the opportunity. By November the fish start to descend because of the cooling weather. Isn't that true Marcus?" Captain Cummins calls to the fisherman and former councilman who is seated in the citizens' chairs.

"That's true!" Marcus replies.

"Why don't you take him for twenty hours in September, then," Gunther suggests, "when you most need him, and I'll take him for twenty hours in October and November, for the harvest. And all three months he works ten as an apothecary and ten as a builder."

"I'd be fine with that," Captain Cummins replies.

"Wait a minute!" Inola exclaims. "He wants to work twenty as a builder! Not ten!"

"Then you take him for thirty hours in December," Gunther says. "No fish or fields that month, and it will help you meet the January deadline you had in mind."

There's a bit more bickering on the council, but eventually Gunther's proposed division of labor is approved, and Raul, satisfied, sits down.

Garland scans the raised hands and, almost reluctantly, calls, "Commander, rise."

Commander Lawson stands. "I have more to add to my previous objection to the trade trip."

"Carry on," Garland says with a barely veiled sigh.

"If this trade trip is approved by the council, I will decline to serve as part of the crew. The captain will be without a second in command."

"The lieutenant commander could be his second in command," Lieutenant Witherspoon says. "Or me, if it came to that."

"The captain will be without a _seasoned_ and _experienced_ second in command," Commander Lawson clarifies. "Which would make the journey more perilous for _all_ those involved."

"Is that all?" Garland asks.

"I want it _recorded_ that I will _not_ serve on the crew for such a trip."

"It _is_ recorded," Judge Ana Carter tells him as she flips a page of her legal pad to reveal a fresh sheet. "You may be seated."

Garland calls on Sarah next, who offers her reasons in support of the trade trip. Mitch finally raises his hand, and when called upon, says, "I heard from Daryl that the Hilltop makes a bit of fuel. Ethanol. We could really use that for our back-up generator for the infirmary, which happens to be an ethanol generator." He looks at Dr. Ahamd. "You know we lose power to the museum sometimes. Normally it's no big deal, but if there's a medical emergency, having the backup could be lifesaving. So I support the trade trip."

"Thank you, Mitch," Garland says. "Your opinion has been recorded."

Carol wonders if Daryl told Mitch that she was uncertain of Dr. Ahmad's vote, and if that's why he said something specifically to persuade the doctor.

Marcus speaks next in favor of the trade trip, saying, "The Chesapeake Bay is bursting with crabs, and crabbing season extends until December. We could do a lot of crabbing while we're at Oceanside in November. I think people would really like a change from the same old seafood, and it would supplement our winter stores. I'm experienced in crabbing and would be happy to join the team."

"I bet you would," the woman who opposed the trip grumbles. "To see all those island women! That's the only reason these men support this trade trip, you know!"

"Henrietta," Garland warns, "you were not called upon. You've had your turn."

Henrietta crosses her arms over her chest and glowers.

The next person to be called upon is a curly-haired teenage boy, the blacksmith's apprentice. A petite teenage girl sits in the chair next to his. The teenager clears his throat. "I'd like to make an application for special permission to marry below the age of eighteen."

"For _you_ to marry?" Garland asks, and points to the girl. " _Her_?"

"Yes, sir. Mayor, sir."

"How old are you, son? Jeremy, is it?"

"Yes, sir. Jeremy. I'm sixteen."

"And how old is Olivia?" Garland asks. Carol wonders if Garland knows the name of every single person in Jamestown. "Young lady, would you rise?" The girl stands nervously. "How old are you?"

"Seventeen," Olivia answers.

"Well, Olivia, do you _want_ to marry this young man?"

"Yes, sir, Mayor, sir."

"Why the rush?"

Olivia's pale cheeks flush pink.

"She's pregnant," Dr. Ahmad tells them.

"Why didn't you tell _me_?" Gunther looks with alarm at the doctor. "She works in the farm fields! We need to put her on light duty."

"She _just_ came to me this afternoon for her first prenatal appointment," Dr. Ahmad tells him. "I told her to apply for a reassignment at the town hall this evening."

"We'll consult the labor logs and get your reassigned to a less physical job," Garland assures Olivia.

Carol watches this exchange with interest. Henry was fifteen when he chased Rachel to Oceanside. Carol wasn't exactly thrilled about his choice to move, or the relationship, but she eventually chose to keep her mouth shut on the matter. There's no talking Henry out of something he has a mind to do, and he essentially emancipated himself. Carol had less than four years to mother him, and she can only hope she made the best of those years – that she left a positive imprint on him. Chances are, despite her better advice, he and Rachel are having sex by now, and Henry could be in this situation in a year. It worries her, the way these teenagers are thrust into adulthood by a world that can no longer afford to shelter them through their late teens.

"Do either of you have living parents?" Ana asks the young couple.

"No, Judge," Jeremy answers.

"Uncles or aunts or grandparents or siblings over the age of 18? Close adult relatives of any kind?"

"No, Judge," Jeremy answers. "We work for our own rations. We're both self-sufficient."

"But where do you _live_?" Captain Cummins wants to know.

"Jeremy's in the barracks," Gunther says. "His bunk is just across from mine. But he didn't mention to me his girlfriend was pregnant." He eyes the young man coolly. "He might have, seeing as I have her laboring in the _fields_."

"I didn't know," Jeremy tells him. "I mean, we weren't sure until recently."

"And you, Olivia?" Captain Cummins asks. "Where do you live?"

"I share a hut in the Indian Village with the widow Williams."

"So where would you live if you married?" the veterinarian wants to know.

The teenagers glance at each other. "I was planning to apply for one of the rooms in the dormitory," Jeremy says.

"That's going to be tight quarters with a child," Inola warns him.

"We'll make do," Jeremy replies. "I'm used to tight quarters in the barracks." He smiles at Olivia. "And the company will be a lot more pleasant."

"Do you understand the legal implications of marriage?" Judge Ana asks them.

The metal of Earl's folding chair creaks as he shifts in it. Carol turns to look at him. The sheriff's jaw is firmly set, as if he's clamping down on his back teeth.

"I…yes," Jeremy says. "We understand we're obligated to work for each other's rations if one or the other can't for some reason. Like if I get sick. Or when she's nearing her due date and laid up with the baby."

"And we know we can't just break up," Olivia adds. "That we'd have to go through the courts for division of property and all that. We _want_ to marry each other." She smiles at her boyfriend.

"We do," he agrees.

"You understand you'll have to work extra hours for the child's schooling and rations once it turns two?" Barry asks. "And until it's at least old enough for an apprenticeship? And that you'll be responsible for its housing until eighteen?"

"Yes, sir," Jeremy replies. "If I can't get enough hours in the blacksmith shop, I can work wherever the council puts me."

"They're self-sufficient," Ana says. "They have the extenuating circumstance of pregnancy. They have a plan for living quarters, and there is no parent or close relative to protest the union. I have no objection to making an age exception to the marriage law in this particular case."

"No objection from me, either," Barry says. "Hell, I wish my daughter's boyfriend would take her off my hands."

Carolyn and Inola both shoot him peeved looks.

"Does anyone have any objections?" Garland asks the council. When no one speaks, he asks for a show of hands for approval. All nine hands go up. "Your application is approved. If you want a ceremony, schedule it with the court or with one of the ministers. If not, you can enter your name in the marriage book during court hours," Garland tells them. "Best of luck to you both."

The teenagers look relieved as they sit down.

Garland looks out over the seated citizens. "Sheriff?" he asks. "Do you have a public comment or proposal?"

At the end of the row, Sheriff Earl stands. He smooths his handlebar mustache with the tips of his fingers, tilts up his sheriff's hat, and takes a few steps to the right, until he's standing not far from Carol and facing the center of the council table, where his wife Ana sits next to Captain Cummins. "I have an application."

"And what's your application?" Garland asks.

"I would like to make an application for divorce on the grounds of infidelity."

Ana gasps.

Captain Cummins blinks.

Garland cries, " _What_?"

And that's when Sheriff Earl storms forward, grabs Captain Cummins by the shirt collar, and drags him over the council table.


	115. Chapter 115

The council has dispersed. Captain Cummins has gone to the infirmary with Dr. Ahmad to have his broken nose reset and his eye iced. Sheriff Earl sits on the ground of a jail cell, his back against the brick wall, his sheriff's hat on his knee, while Carol leans back in the wooden chair at the small jailhouse table and says, "You know I _have_ to, right? Twenty-four hours."

"I'm aware of the cool-down law. Although, usually that's to give a man time to sober up. I am _deadly_ sober."

"You did assault a councilmember, Earl."

"They're going to need a different judge."

"Annette will preside." Annette is eighteen, and she's an apprentice judge. She's been studying under Ana. "It'll be her first real case. I suppose she'll preside over the divorce settlement, too."

"I reckon." Earl lets out a weary sigh. "My fate in the hands of a teenage girl."

"I'm sure Annette will serve as an impartial judge. Your fate will be in the hands of the jury. And I suspect they'll be sympathetic."

"Maybe, if the prosecutor manages to get me a jury that isn't full of women infatuated with the handsome, charming captain."

"It's getting late," Carol says. "I'll bring you some dinner. Any preference?"

"I don't care. As long as the drink is moonshine."

"I wish I could," Carol tells him gently. "Are you _sure_ about them?"

Earl tosses his hat onto the small bench in the cell. "I've seen the way the captain flirts with her. At first I didn't pay it any mind, because he flirts with most women. I was a bit jealous. She seemed flattered. But I didn't think she would _ever_ …" He grits his teeth and shakes his head. "The rumor is all over town that he's been sleeping with a married woman. Ana used to have these occasional Saturday night _study sessions_ with her apprentice to review laws and court procedures. This afternoon, I was talking to Annette. Come to find out, Annette has gone out on a date every single Saturday night for the past year. She's seen all the Saturday night movies. Every. Single. One. There never were any Saturday night study sessions."

"I'm sorry." Carol's sure Earl's right. Sarah never said what married woman she caught the captain with, but she seemed unsurprised by the scuffle that erupted in the council room.

"Ana stopped going to those study sessions about the same time she started showing. I suppose the captain lost interest in sex at that point. Or maybe Ana did. Hell, Carol, I don't even know if that child's _mine_! I guess we'll see how fair it is when it comes out."

Earl has an Italian complexion, even if he has an English name. His eyes are espresso-brown and his hair is nearly black, while the captain has blonde hair and light hazel eyes, but Carol's not sure one would be able to tell the baby's father right away, if at all. That's going to be a mess for the court - to determine which man works for the father's share of the child's rations when it's age two to twelve.

Carol waits in silence to see if he has more to say. He does. "I don't understand. Why didn't she just marry _him_ instead of _me_ in the first place?"

"You don't think they've been involved _that_ long, do you?" Carol asks.

"Oh, she dated him. She dated a number of men before she settled on me. I thought I'd beat out the competition. But I guess not." He runs a hand anxiously through his thick, dark hair. "So why didn't she just pick _him_? From the start?"

"I get the impression the captain is not exactly the marrying kind."

"So you think she wanted to have her cake and eat it, too?"

"I don't know, Earl," Carol says softly. "I'm sorry you're going through this." She stands. "I'll be back with your dinner in a bit. Your defense lawyer should stop by first thing in the morning. The council has appointed Deputy Santiago to serve as acting sheriff until your assault case is resolved."

"Well, he'll make a good replacement for me. He's competent. And ethical. A bit _flippant_ , but…"

"It's not permanent, Earl."

"The council could demote me."

"It won't," she assures him.

Earl leans his head back wearily against the brick wall. "We'll see about that."

"I'll be back with your dinner."

[*]

"This town's a goddamn soap opera," Daryl mutters. Carol has just told him what happened at the open town hall. He stands, leaning with arms crossed on the kitchen counter, while she sits on a stool across from him eating the cold leftovers from the dinner he cooked. Sweetheart is already asleep in her crib, on her stomach, in a light onesie, with her little bottom pushed up in the air. Daryl's left the drapes open in order to keep an eye on her.

"Captain Cummins didn't even react," Carol says, "he was so stunned. By the time I broke it up, Earl had already gotten his licks in."

"Yeah? He get some good ones?"

"He broke the captain's nose. There was blood all over his nice white button-down shirt. And he's probably going to have a black eye."

"Almost went lookin' for ya," Daryl murmurs. "Got worried when ya weren't home when ya said ya'd be."

"Well, now you know how _I_ feel."

"I been better 'bout that, ain't I?"

"You have," she agrees. "I guess you got hungry waiting for me." She pops a bit of meat into her mouth. That's all he's cooked. _Meat_. And it's very salty – almost country-ham-level salty. "What am I eating?"

"Wild boar."

"Are there any veggies?"

Daryl stands straight, turns, and opens a cabinet in the hutch. He pulls out a jar of pickled green beans, unscrews the cap, and slides it across the counter to her.

Carol fishes out a green bean and eats it.

"Think I put too much salt on the boar," he says.

"Maybe a little. How much do we have left for the week?"

"Not much," he admits.

"We'll make do. When did you put Sweetheart down?"

"Half hour ago."

That's an hour before her usual bedtime. "You know," Carol tells him, "this means she's going to be up at five a.m."

"Don't matter. I gotta be up to go huntin'."

"Yes, but she'll want to nurse when she wakes up, and you can't take her over to Shannon that early." Carol doesn't plan to wean her for another three and a half months, when she'll be one. When they do, they'll need to trade for more cow's milk – or work extra hours for it. Right now they get three liters of cow's milk each week, plus one of either goat or sheep. That's enough for Sweetheart to have two cups per day, but they're going to want some milk to cook with, too.

"Just give 'er a little apple juice to tide 'er over."

"Daryl, that's not good for – "

"- Hell, I thought you'd be glad I got 'er down early! Now ya can relax."

"I'm sorry. Thank you for getting her to bed. And for the dinner. I appreciate it."

He hrmphs. "Don't _sound_ like ya appreciate it."

"Well, it's not as if you never take me for granted."

"I do?"

"Sometimes, Pookie."

"Nah."

Carol fishes another green bean from the jar. "When was the last time you thanked me for doing your laundry?"

"Dunno." Daryl shrugs. "Last time ya did it."

"No, Daryl, you don't even _notice_ when I do it. Clean clothes just magically appear in your dresser drawers."

He scratches the back of his head. "Yeah, well did you notice I fixed the ceiling fan?"

"I didn't even notice it was broken."

"'Zactly! 'Cause I fixed it 'fore you could notice."

Carol waves a pickled bean at him. "You know what, let's not keep score. No one wins this game."

"A'ight." He leans forward with his elbows on the counter again, close to her. "Kiss 'n make up?"

She smiles and leans forward. His lips press against hers and linger for a sweet moment.

"Ya taste like vinegar," he says when he pulls away.

"It's the pickled beans." She puts the slender, green bean in her mouth and slides it suggestively in and out while making an _mhmmm_ sound.

Daryl predictably flushes red. "Stahp!"

She laughs and eats the bean.

His blush is fading, and now he's looking at her through half drooped eyelids. "Could pull the drapes 'n do that if ya want."

"If _I_ want?" she asks skeptically.

" _Seems_ like ya want."

"I was teasing."

"Been awhile."

"Oh, Good Lord, Daryl! It's _always_ been awhile with you. It's been two days."

"Not for _that_ it ain't. Been like…two _weeks_."

"It's been a week _at most_. But, you know, maybe if you pour me some of that dandelion wine Madam Linda gave us as a housewarming gift, and we sit and cuddle for a while… _maybe_ I'll be in the mood later."

They settle on the couch, each with a glass of dandelion wine. Dog looks up sleepily from his spot on the bear skin rug and then lowers his head. Daryl puts his bare feet up on the wicker coffee table and slings an arm around her shoulders. Carol angles herself, pulls her feet up on the couch, and settles against his side. They both take a sip of wine. Daryl crinkles his nose. Carol rolls her tongue and says, "Oh, God, Gunther was right. That's _not_ good." She takes another sip.

"Yer gonna drink it anyway?" he asks.

"After what happened today? I could probably use a light buzz. And I'll get used to the sharp taste after half a glass."

"Cheers," Daryl murmurs, and raises his glass. They clink glasses and both sip again.

"Ugh," Carol says. "Maybe if I chug it." She tips the glass back and starts to chug it, but ends up spitting the liquid back into the glass. "Nope. I can't. That's it. No more." She leans forward and sets the glass on the wicker coffee table.

"Want me to take ya to the tavern? For a pint of brew?"

Carol nods back over her shoulder at Sweetheart. "We can't."

"Oh. Yeah." They still aren't entirely used to not having Shannon around to watch Sweetheart whenever they need her to. "Can go get a growler to go, if ya want?"

"Would you?" Carol asks.

"Yeah, 'specially if it'll get me blown."

Carol rolls her eyes. "No guarantees."

"Make ya happy, though?"

"It would."

"Good enough." He takes his arm off her and sets his glass down on the coffee table. He points to the wine bottle, which is still over half full. "Want me to toss this?"

"No. I'll use it for cooking. It might work with some kind of bittersweet dish."

"A'ight." He puts a hand on the back of the couch, leans in, and kisses her. "Be back in a jiff."

When he's gone, Carol settles her head against a throw pillow situated against the arm of the couch and closes her eyes for just a moment. At least, it _feels_ like just a moment, but when she wakes up, the sun is streaming through an open set of shutters, the blanket Inola weaved has been draped over her body, Sweetheart is sitting up and babbling happily to herself in her crib, and Daryl has left a note on the coffee table – _Gone hunting. Beer's in the cooler._


	116. Chapter 116

Carol brings Sheriff Earl a breakfast of scrambled eggs and strawberries, along with a cup of water. It's the same breakfast Deputy Earl often brought Daryl, at Sheriff Garland's orders, back in the days when Daryl was in this very cell.

She lays the plate and cup on the small wooden table, opens the cell door, and gestures with her head. Earl emerges and sits. Carol sits down across from him. He picks up the fork she's left him and toys with his food. "I'm not much hungry."

"Try. You'll need some energy for the trial."

"Has the jury been selected?" he asks.

She nods. "They started last night and finished this morning." They had to call two pools of twelve before they could come up with six who weren't too likely to be prejudiced in the case one way or the other.

"How many women?"

"You really think women are more likely to be prejudiced against you?" she asks.

"I think men are more likely to understand wanting to beat up the man who slept with your wife."

"Four," Carol answers.

Earl sighs.

"The trial starts in half an hour." She gestures to the plate. "Eat up."

[*]

The sticks over the bear pit are untouched, except by the light feet of squirrels and other small critters. Mitch and Daryl wander further in the woods to set up another cage trap for fox or rabbit or whatever wanders in after the bait of berries. "I suppose Carol told you about all the excitement at the open town hall?" Mitch asks.

"Mhmhm."

"You think the baby is the captain's?"

"Dunno." That wasn't something Daryl had thought about. He feels suddenly a hundred times worse for Earl. And for that _baby_. He hopes one of those men _wants_ to be the father, whether he is or not.

"That's going to be weird, the two of them both on council, the judge and the captain…with everyone knowing what they were up to."

"Mhmm." Daryl crouches and tinkers with the trap. Dog sniffs a circle around the wire cage. When the canine tries to eat the berries, Daryl scolds him, and Dog sits back on his haunches and whimpers.

[*]

After spending most of the morning with Sweetheart, and then depositing her with Shannon, Carol drops by the jailhouse before beginning her early afternoon rounds. The cell is empty, because Earl is at his trial. Acting-sheriff Santiago hands her his notebook. "There's an accusation of petty theft of private garden strawberries for you to look into." He winks. "I left that one special just for you."

Carol flips to the page in the notebook. It's Mrs. Conway. Again. Mrs. Conway doesn't put wire netting on her private plot or cover her plants or lay out any repellents, but she always blames the neighbors for snatching her berries. Every time she does, a deputy appeases her by interviewing the neighbors, examining the garden, and then telling her the same thing as the last time – the squirrels did it. "I'll see if I can't crack the case," Carol says dryly.

"She's _got_ to stop relying on Deputy Tabby to protect her berries," Santiago insists.

Tabby is one of Jamestown's four cats. Three of them hang out in the barns to deal with the mice, but Tabby is more adventurous. She likes to stroll through the Indian Village and the old fort, hunting her prey and receiving the affectionate attention of children, as well as the occasional treat or plate of milk. She acts more like a dog than a cat. It was one of the Jamestown children who named her Deputy Tabby, and the name stuck.

"Maybe we should cite her for filing a false report," Carol suggests. "It might make the complaints stop, at least."

"Except she believes it," Santiago says, "so there's no _intent_. Just take a few minutes to humor her."

Carol sighs. "Fine. Anything else I need to follow up on?"

"Well, eventually you're going to need to interview all the parties involved to investigate the paternity of Ana Carter's baby and report your evidence to the court for the child support settlement. Even if Earl's restored as sheriff after his trial, he can't handle that investigation, for obvious reasons. Neither can I."

"Why can't you?" Carol asks.

"Because I'm sleeping with one of the witnesses." He sounds real broken up about that. An immense grin spreads across his face when he says it.

"Did you know?" Carol asks. "About them?"

Santiago shakes his head. "Sarah didn't tell me who she caught him with. But she did _confirm_ it after the … _incident_. Not that she has any information on _when_ it started. It's going to get personal, figuring out who's more likely to be the father."

"Why me?" Carol asks. She doesn't want to ask Earl, Ana, or the captain a bunch of questions about the timing of sex.

"Because none of the other deputies want to do it. Besides, you have a good read on people when it comes to telling if they're lying." He smiles. " _Detective Dixon_."

Carol shakes her head.

"We'll wait a few months to worry about it," Santiago says. "The court will make an initial division of property for the divorce, but it won't take up the child support question until the baby is born. And if there's a miscarriage before then, we won't have to bother."

"Well, that's bleak." Carol flips the notebook shut and tucks it in her shirt pocket.

"In other news…Did you hear?"

"Hear what?" Carol asks.

"The council took the vote."

In all the tumult, she'd forgotten about that – forgotten it was August 31st and that the closed-door council debate and vote on the trade trip was scheduled for this morning.

"And?"

"Rumor is that the November trade trip was approved."

Carol restrains her excitement. Jamestown rumors aren't always true. She should confirm it before she lets herself be _too_ happy. So when she's done with Mrs. Conway's case, she lets her rounds take her all the way to the museum, where she peers into the open doorway of Garland's office. As usual, his desk is scattered with paperwork.

The mayor looks up and sounds genuinely pleased to see her. "Hey, Carol."

"Can I come in for a moment?"

"Of course." He gestures to the empty chair across from his desk, and she sits down. "I heard the vote was in favor of the trade trip? Is that true?"

Garland nods. "Yes. The council has voted to send a trade team on the _Susan Constant_ to Oceanside. The team and crew will stay for both days of the trade festival, and then an extra two days for crabbing in the Chesapeake. So the trip will take eight to ten days total, depending on the winds."

"And how will you decide who goes?" Carol asks.

"The council will start taking applications in mid-September, for both the crew and the trade team. We'll conduct interviews in mid-October and have a crew and team selected by October 30. You'll automatically be on the team, of course, since you know these communities and we need you to introduce us. Daryl, too, if he wants to go."

"Well, _of course_ he wants to go," Carol says.

"I didn't know if one of you would want to stay behind with Sweetheart."

"We'd take Sweetheart with us."

Garland's mouth opens for a moment and then closes. "I don't think that's a good idea, Carol. She'll be, what, eleven months? The journey is at least two days each way, and who knows what you might encounter. She'll be safer here, in Jamestown."

Carol _knows_ that's true, but she wants her son Henry to meet her daughter, and she wants Michonne and Aaron and the others to meet her, too. And she doesn't want to be away from Sweetheart for ten days. "Well, Daryl and I will discuss it."

Garland tilts his head slightly. "It won't be entirely up to you. The council has to approve the crew and team. It may _not_ approve a _baby_. Aside from the risk the journey might pose to Sweetheart, you also need to consider how inconvenient a baby might be in those conditions. Shannon and I can watch her while you're gone. You know we'll take good care of her."

" _You're_ not going?" she asks.

"As much as I miss the adventure of sometimes being outside these gates, I can't leave Jamestown. I have too much responsibility here. There will be a representative from the council on that team, however."

"Well, Captain Cummins, at least," Carol says. "He'll have to navigate."

"Mhmhm," Garland murmurs noncommittally.

Lieutenant Witherspoon pops his head in the door, says hello to both, and takes a step inside. "Sorry to interrupt, but, Mayor, the council is assembled and waiting for you."

"I'll be there in five minutes."

"Yes, sir." The lieutenant nods and disappears.

"You have _another_ council meeting today?" Carol asks. The debate and vote on the trade trip probably took an hour already.

Garland shuts a folder on his desk. "Busy times."

"But Captain Cummins is out on the river. I saw his ship leaving when I patrolled by. And I think Ana is in the courtroom, watching Earl's trial."

"They won't be needed for this particular meeting." He pushes his chair back and stands. "You and Daryl should come over for dinner tomorrow night. We miss having you around."

"I think it's _us_ who owes _you_ dinner. Why don't we say six? Tomorrow?"

Garland nods. "I'll run it by Shannon, but assume it's a yes unless you hear otherwise." He walks by the table and rests a hand on her shoulder. "Congratulations on your trade trip. You were very convincing."

[*]

When Mitch and Daryl return from the hunt, it's an hour past the time when he told Carol he'd be home for dinner. They stayed out later than usual, because they didn't want to come back empty handed, and they were having trouble catching anything. Then they realized they went a little deeper into the woods than they thought they had, and it took them a long while to hike home.

They pass Lieutenant Witherspoon on the docks, who is showing a repair man a weak bit of wood on the _Godspeed_. "Hello, gentlemen," he says.

" _Gentlemen_?" Mitch asks. "Well, we're honored."

Daryl can't tell if Mitch is amused or bitter. He sounds a bit of both.

Lieutenant Witherspoon looks down at the docks and then raises his head. "I hear there's live music at the tavern tomorrow night."

"The Mason Brothers band," Mitch says. "They're my favorite of all these pub bands."

"Are you going?" the lieutenant asks.

"Most likely."

Lieutenant Witherspoon shrugs. "I might pop in for a drink at some point myself."

Harry, the young sailor, jumps down from the _Godspeed_ onto the planks, glances from Mitch to the lieutenant, hides a smirk, and says, "She looks sound from the inside, but we better replace the board just in case."

"Well you can help the repairman," the lieutenant tells him.

"I have that date with Kelly tonight, sir. Could you possibly assign someone else?"

Daryl can't help but feel a twinge of resentment on Raul's behalf. Of course, the kid knows Kelly's seeing other guys, but it's got to burn him. She needs to settle on one of them soon and put Raul out of his misery, one way or the other. Raul says they've gone out three times now, and– _you know, like…it was fun_. _I think I'm really starting to like her._

"Very well," the lieutenant replies. "Come with me. We'll see if Jacob can do it." Harry and the lieutenant walk on, in the opposite direction of Mitch and Daryl.

As Daryl resumes walking beside Mitch, Dog pitter pattering across the dock beside him, the other hunter mutters, "I wish I didn't have a weakness for a man in uniform."

"Ya like 'em young," Daryl observes.

"Half plus seven, that's the rule. And the lieutenant's almost exactly that. He just turned 26."

"Ya ain't 59!"

" _He's_ half _my age_ plus seven. I'm not _twice_ his plus seven."

"Oh."

"But, damn, you're quick at math!"

Daryl grunts. "Still got the wrong answer." He reaches down to scratch Dog's head as they walk and then exclaims, "Yer 37!"

Mitch laughs. "Yep. Right answer this time. Although I'll be 38 in December, so think about what you're going to get me for my birthday."

"Pfft."

Dog's feet patter over the wood and onto the dirt path. One of the dairy girls approaches them. Not Autumn, the older one. Candice? No, Cassie. "Hello, Daryl," she says with a smile. "What did you catch there?"

Daryl lifts the rope slung over his shoulder slightly, which holds a large jack rabbit. "Rabbit."

"Are they tricky?" she asks. "To catch?"

He shrugs. "Nah."

"I just always thought, you know, from the Bugs Bunny cartoons."

Daryl chuckles. Is she serious? Did she really think those cartoons were a reflection of reality? Is she _that_ stupid? Or is she just flirting again?"

"We need to get these to the butcher," Mitch says.

"Of course." Cassie smiles one last time at Daryl and walks on.

Daryl cranes his neck back to glance at her. She's not bad looking, and she's also turned to look over her shoulder at him. Maybe Carol was _right_ – maybe he really could fuck half these Jamestown women if he _wanted_ to.

"What the hell are you doing?" Mitch murmurs.

Daryl looks forward again. "What?" he grunts.

"Checking out that woman like that, when you've got a perfectly good woman of your own waiting for you at home?"

"Wasn't checking 'er out!" Daryl insists.

"Don't you mess up a good thing, brother," Mitch warns.

"Pffft. I ain't a goddamn moron."

"I didn't think Ana was either, and she just threw away a perfectly good husband. Earl was crazy about her. _Committed._ "

"Man, trust me, there ain't no one in the world for me but Carol."

"Good." Mitch walks on silently for a moment and then says, softly, "Must be nice, to have something like that."

"Yeah," Daryl says quietly. "Yeah. 'S real nice."

He thinks about just how nice it is all the way to the butcher, and the whole time he scrubs up from the hunt in the washing trough, and the whole time he walks home to the cabin he's built his wife with his own hands, hoping she's kept his dinner warm for him. Which is why it's such a jolt to his system when he opens the door and finds Gunther sitting at _his_ table, in _his_ chair, across from _his_ wife, and drinking from _his_ pewter beer mug.


	117. Chapter 117

"Hey, Pookie," Carol says. "You're late." Daryl's so irritated by Gunther's presence that he doesn't even notice the _Pookie_ and can't be embarrassed by it. "I kept your dinner warm. I already ate." She stands up and heads to the wood stove, where she stirs the stew in the pot and dishes it into a bowl.

"'S _my_ chair," Daryl tells Gunther, and maybe his eyes tell the man something even less polite.

Gunther drains the last of his beer, pushes back, and stands. "Thank you for the drink, Carol, I appreciate it. Lovely home you have here." He picks up his hat and settles it on his head. "Let me know what you decide."

 _Decide?_ Daryl thinks. What the hell has Gunther asked his wife to _decide_?

Gunther nods to Daryl. "Good to see you," he says before slipping out the front door.

"You give him the last of my beer?" Daryl asks as Carol sets his bowl on the table in front of his chair.

"He was drinking water," Carol tells him. She clears the mug from the table. "He's taking a break from alcohol. Doctor's orders."

Daryl sits down roughly in _his_ chair. It's still warm from Gunther's ass. He pulls the bowl close.

Carol takes down another mug from the hutch and fills it with water from a pitcher for him. "Although I think it was more Madam Linda's constant nagging that persuaded him." She sets the mug in front of Daryl.

"Mhmhm." Daryl scrapes the bottom of the bowl with his spoon as he stirs.

Carol puts a hand on one hip. "You were rude to Gunther."

"How?" Daryl shoves a spoonful of stew in his mouth. It's warm, but not hot.

"You _know_ how." She sits down in the chair opposite him.

He looks over at the crib, where Sweetheart is sleeping. "Thought ya didn't like puttin' 'er down this early."

"Don't change the subject."

"What? Tell _me_ not to put her down so early. 'N then you do it? Why? So ya can pay more attention to _Gunther_?"

"I did it because she slept almost as late when you put her down early as she normally does, and she was happy alone in her crib when she woke up, so I figured _we_ could use the extra quiet time in the evening. I think she's giving up her second nap. She probably needs to sleep more at night."

Daryl grunts and shovels more stew into his mouth.

Carol crosses her arms over her chest where she sits. "Daryl, I don't like this. This jealousy. I don't like it."

Daryl shoves his bowl forward on the table. "Yeah? Well I don't like some man I _know_ has the hots for _my_ wife coming to _my_ house when 'm not home 'n – "

" – Stop. Just stop. Please."

Daryl falls silent. He looks at her curiously. She sounds…not angry. _Disappointed?_ That's the tone in her voice. _Disappointment_. In _him_. And her disappointment crushes his heart right down into his stomach.

"Gunther came by to talk to me about something important. I offered him a cup of water. That's all. You have absolutely no reason to doubt my loyalty, my fidelity – "

"- Ain't you I'm worried 'bout," Daryl says, but he doesn't say it angrily. He says it by way of explanation, almost like a plea for her to understand and not be disappointed in him.

"Even if Gunter _did_ have the _hots_ for me, as you say – which he _doesn't_ – I am perfectly capable of letting him know if he crosses a line. I don't like the possessiveness, Daryl. You know, Ed used to - "

"- I ain't Ed!" Is _that_ why she sounds so damn disappointed? "Don't _ever_ fuckin' compare me to Ed!" Now he _does_ sound angry again.

Carol glances at the crib, where Sweetheart stirs but doesn't awaken. She stands and goes and draws the drapes around the baby's room. It's not going to do much about dampening the sound of Daryl's voice, but it's a clear enough message to him that he better lower it.

She sits down across from him again. "You're nothing like Ed," she says softly. "I didn't intend to imply that you are. But after what I went through with him – his _possessiveness_ , his _control_ , his refusal to let me have male friends – _any_ friends really – you have to know how very important it is to me that you _trust_ me, and that you not - "

"- A'ight," he cuts her off.

Carol looks at him doubtfully. "All right?"

"A'ight. 'M sorry."

"You're not going to be suspicious of Gunther's intent anymore?"

"Didn't say _that_. But 'm gonna trust ya to…what ya said. Let 'm know the lines 'n shit."

"Really?"

"Mhmhm."

"Thank you."

"Carol…" He leans forward slightly on the table. That disappointment in her voice still rings like an echo between his ears. "I ain't Ed. But I ain't perfect neither. Hell, 'm a fuckin' mess."

She smiles gently. "Aren't we both? But remember what you said? We can be messes together."

He nods, smiles slightly, and draws his stew back in front of himself. He picks up his spoon and gestures to the contents of the bowl. " _Real_ good. 'S it?"

"Brunswick stew. You've never had it?"

"Nah," he murmurs as he takes another bite.

"It's a southern classic. I thought you would have."

"M'mama wasn't much of a cook. Ya know…if it didn't come in a can or a box." He shrugs. "We didn't eat it."

"It's got fresh garlic, onion, and tomatoes. I used some canned corn from last season. I could only use a fourth of the butter my mother's old recipe calls for…apocalyptic modifications, you know. And I used the last of the wild boar instead of pulled pork. No sugar, I didn't want to spare that, but it usually has a little brown sugar in it. And no lima beans. They don't grow those here."

"Hate lima beans anyhow."

"I love them. Especially in Brunswick stew. And usually it has Worcestershire sauce, but we don't have that. So…I put a little extra pepper in it."

"Damn good. Thanks." He looks up and catches her eyes, to see if she's still mad at him.

She smiles. He smiles in relief and returns to his stew. When he's almost done, she asks, "Don't you want to know what Gunther came to talk to me about?"

"Mhmh," he murmurs as he swallows down his last bite. He takes a sip of water. "What?"

"There's a clause in the charter that any council member can be removed for 'conduct unbecoming a councilman' by a vote of at least six other council members. I knew that. I've read the charter a half dozen times. But what I didn't know was that they applied it today. The other seven members of the council voted unanimously to remove both Captain Cummins and Judge Carter unless they voluntarily resign."

" _Damn_. For adultery?"

"It's an intentionally vague clause. It doesn't mean they'll remove _every_ adulterer who gets on the council. But the council thought it was going to be too difficult for David and Ana to work together given the public embarrassment over their affair, and with all the rumors flying around, and people taking Earl's side or Ana's side…and the ongoing paternity case…It's just going to be a _huge_ distraction to the work of the council if those two are on it. And it seemed unfair to boot one and not the other."

"Makes sense. But are people who voted for 'em gonna be pissed?"

"Maybe, but hopefully not at the council. When informed of the vote, both David and Ana agreed to step down instead, so they don't have that conduct unbecoming mark on their records, and so that they can run again in the future if they like. As far as the public knows, they voluntarily resigned. So don't mention the council vote to anyone else. I probably shouldn't have told you."

"'M quiet as the grave."

Carol seems to be waiting for him to ask something, but he doesn't know what. Finally she says, "Don't you want to know what they're going to do now that they're down two council members?"

"What?"

"The charter says that if a councilmember resigns, dies in office, is impeached by the citizens, or removed by a vote of six other council members, then he or she is to be replaced by the next runner up in the election."

It slowly dawns on Daryl what this might mean. "So…"

"I wanted to discuss it with you before I told them yes."

"Hell is there to discuss? Ya want this?"

"Yes."

"'N grab the bull by the horns, councilwoman!"

Carol grins, which makes Daryl grin back at her happiness.

"Deputy Thomas will be the other new council member."

"Which of ya was tenth and which was eleventh?"

"Gunther wouldn't say."

"Bet Garland knows."

"And I bet _he_ won't say either. Not that it matters. I'm just glad Commander Lawson wasn't tenth or eleventh." She stands and clears his bowl and cup.

When she returns to the table, before she can go sit in her own chair, Daryl grabs her around the waist and pulls her onto his lap. He nuzzles her neck and murmurs, "Congratulations, councilwoman."

She chuckles, turns her head, and kisses him. "I might be a little busier now," she says when she pulls back. "You know I'll only get paid ten hours of rations for council work, and it takes about fifteen to sixteen hours a week."

"Yeah. Know."

"But I'll still do my twenty with the sheriff's department, so we'll be getting ten hours of extra rations. Which is good, because then I can pay Shannon more for babysitting Sweetheart."

It suddenly occurs to Daryl that this means she'll be spending fifteen to sixteen hours a week working with… _Gunther_. "What 'bout tomorrow? Ya workin'?" It's normally her day off. If he can't ask her to spend less time with Gunther, then maybe the next best thing is to ask her to spend _more_ time with _him_.

"No."

"I gotta check the traps, but I'll be back by noon at the latest. Wanna do somethin'?"

Carol smiles. "Are you asking me on a date?"

"Family date. Take the baby."

"Take her where?"

"Dunno…take a rowboat?" He suggests. "To the lighthouse island. Picnic or some shit?"

"Given a choice between the two, I'll go with the picnic."

"Stahp."

Carol laughs, kisses him and then presses her forehead to his. "Yes, let's have a picnic lunch tomorrow." She slides off his lap and stands. "But we need to be home by four. I invited Garland and Shannon for dinner tomorrow at six. I need time to cook."

"A'ight."

"I'm a councilwoman!" she says, obviously still reeling from the surprise. She even seems to bounce in place.

"Calls for a celebration."

"What kind of celebration?" she asks.

"Sex?" He wants sex because he _likes_ sex, but also because it will make him feel like things are okay between them. He feels vulnerable throwing the suggestion out there, like he does when he has to walk somewhere without his crossbow on his shoulder. He's afraid she's going to shoot him down.

She doesn't. " _And_ that beer we didn't get to last night. Not at the same time though."

Relieved, Daryl smirks and jokes, "Could lick it off ya."

"Eww. No."

Daryl stands, drags her close, and kisses her, but the foreplay is interrupted by a knock on the door. If that's Gunther, Daryl thinks, he's going to kill him.

It's not. It's the one man Daryl can forgive such an interruption – Garland. "Can I speak to Carol for a minute?"

Daryl opens the door wider and Garland comes inside. He glances at the drawn drapes around Sweetheart's room and speaks quietly. "Today the council voted - "

"- Gunther told me," Carol interrupts him.

"Will you accept?"

"I accept."

" _Good_. Then you and Thomas will be installed tomorrow morning. I just spoke to him. He accepted, also. Then we'll have a meeting to debrief the two of you."

"How _long_ of a meeting?" asks Carol, glancing at Daryl warily.

He hopes she doesn't reneg on their plans.

"No more than an hour. Likely less. We'll be done by ten. Did you hear? The jury returned a verdict in Earl's case."

"What was it?" Carol asks anxiously.

"Guilty of assault against a council member." She sighs and Garland continues, "But they went lightly on the sentencing. A fine of one week's tobacco rations."

"That's it?" Carol asks.

"And…Earl's on administrative leave for four more weeks, to allow things to cool down. He'll do his twenty hours in the fields until then."

"I bet Gunther will be happy about that," Carol says.

Daryl tries not to be bothered by the fact that his wife cares what Gunther will be happy about.

"I'm sure he will," Garland agrees. "That mean means Santiago is still acting sheriff for the time being, and the rest of you deputies will be picking up the slack. Expect to be working five to ten extra hours for the next month, until Earl is restored."

"On top of the council?" Daryl asks.

"It's just for a month," Carol reassures him.

"Santiago would like your help drawing up the patrol schedules tomorrow morning," Garland tells her, "after the council meeting."

"Will we be done by noon?" Carol asks. "Daryl and I had plans. It's technically our day off."

"It never took me or Earl more than an hour, but you're not used to it. I'd say two hours?"

Carol puts a hand on Daryl's back. "I'll be done when you get back from checking the traps or I'll make Santiago do the rest himself. I'm not giving up our family time."

Appreciating the assurance, Daryl nods.

"Sorry to interrupt y'all's evening," Garland says. "I just wanted to share the news. We'll talk more tomorrow night at dinner." He glances at Carol. "If we're still on?"

"Six o'clock."

Garland nods and heads out the door.

Daryl slides the bolt latch shut behind him, turns to Carol, and pulls her to himself by her belt loop, growling, "Where were we?"

He gets her half undressed by the doorway, but then they make their way kissing to the bedroom, where the disrobing continues. It's a sweet combination of makeup sex and victory sex. It starts with a lot of teasing and petting and caressing and smiling but ends up with the bed's headboard slamming against the wooden wall of the cabin, Carol screaming Daryl's name along with a string of yeses, and Daryl growling out his climax. The baby awakens with a cry.

Daryl collapses, panting, on his wife, rolls off her, and mutters. "Shit."

"We were too loud. You better get her."

"You were the one screamin'."

"You were the one who _made_ me scream."

He slides out of bed, pulls on his boxers, and goes to rock the baby back to sleep. In a couple minutes, Carol, wearing only her panties and tank top, joins him. She rests a hand on his shoulder, and they look down at their daughter together as her little eyelids droop closed.

Daryl waits another minute to lay her in the crib, and Carol quietly pulls the drapes. Just as quietly, Daryl tiptoes to the kitchen and pours them each a pint of the beer he bought – but didn't touch – last night. At least Gunther didn't drink his beer. He hands her one, and they settle on the couch together, Carol with her head leaned on his shoulder.

"I think she's out," he whispers.

"I think so, too," Carol whispers back. "In fact, I think we can stop whispering."

"Ya did shout pretty loud there," he says in his normal voice. "Think ya liked what I did at the end there."

"What did you do?"

"Dunno. Wasn't really payin' attention. Kind of distracted by how damn good ya felt."

Carol chuckles.

They're quiet for a minute and he says, "Listen, m'sorry 'bout actin' jealous. Just…I _really_ think Gunther likes ya 'n ya just don't seem to _see_ it."

"Well, Cassie Anderson seems to like you, and you don't seem to see that."

"Nah, I see it now. And I ain't gonna flirt with her no more."

Carol sits up straight. " _No more_?"

"Uh…"

"What do you mean you aren't going to flirt with her _no more_?"

"Listen – "

"- Daryl, I didn't even know you knew that woman's name. You always just called her and Autumn the dairy girls."

"Okay, what happened is…"

Carol raises an eyebrow. "Yes?"

"They flirted with me the other day. 'N I flirted back just to…ya know. See."

"See what?"

"If I still got game."

Carol laughs. She covers her mouth with her hand so she won't wake Sweetheart. Eventually, she lets her hand drop. "Pookie, you _never_ had game."

"Maybe I _do_. Just ain't never played it."

"So tell me how this exchange went exactly."

He tells her about the whole Autumn/Winter thing.

"You're lucky you're cute," she replies, "because that's the worst joke ever."

"Cassie laughed."

"I _bet_ she did." Carol sips her beer. "And you flirted with her again?"

"Nah…mean… not _really_. She stopped me on the docks today." He tells her about that exchange.

"Bugs Bunny?" Carol asks. "I guess _she's_ lucky _she's_ cute, too."

"She ain't cute."

"No? You don't think so?"

He shrugs. "She ain't you."

"Gunther isn't you either, Daryl."

He nods slowly.

"So…" Carol says. "I guess we just agree to trust each other, then?"

"Mhmhm."

She raises her pint glass. "It's a deal?"

"'S a deal." They clang glasses and drain their beer.

Carol puts out her hand. "Shake on it?"

Instead of shaking her hand, he takes it, turns it over, and brings it to his lips to kiss it. Carol giggles. "See?" he says. "I got game."


	118. Chapter 118

Carol tries not to appear nervous during the installation ceremony the next morning. Daryl has delayed his trap-checking to come watch, even though she told him he didn't have to. He looks ready to bolt as soon as it's over, however. He's chosen an aisle seat, and his pack and bow rest leaned against his leg. Dog waits for him obediently at the exit. Mitch is there, too, lingering toward the back, leaned against the wall. She's not sure if he's here as a friend to watch _her_ installed, if he's waiting for Daryl, or if he just wants an excuse to talk to Lieutenant Witherspoon who, along with all the other current council members, is present for the ceremony.

Sweetheart sits on Daryl's lap, chewing on her favorite toy – the multi-colored set of plastic keys. Carol keeps them in the Igloo cooler overnight, so they're nice and cold in the morning and soothing to her gums. She's pretty sure her little girl is about to pop her first tooth. "Lower central incisor," Daryl told her this morning. "Book says six to ten months."

Shannon sits next to Daryl, with VanDaryl in a baby carrier on her chest. The little tyke has developed good neck and head control and is facing out now. A shock of reddish-brown hair falls over his eyes. Carol can't believe how green they've gotten, when they used to be a solid blue, but they look a lot like Shannon's now. There's still plenty of Garland in him, however, in the way his hair waves instead of curls, and in the calmness in his features.

Santiago, in his temporary role as acting sheriff, leads the ceremonies, as Earl did the last time. It's probably just as well Earl's on administrative leave, because Ana is once again doing the swearing in, and it would be awkward if they were both present. As Ana holds out the charter, she seems less than pleased with the task of presenting the oath to her own replacement. Carol places her hand over the handwritten document.

"Do you solemnly swear," Ana asks, "to uphold the charter of New Jamestown, and to serve this community with honesty and integrity, to the best of your ability?"

"I do," Carol answers.

The ceremony is even more sparsely attended than the last one. Deputy Thomas has two family members in attendance – a sister and brother-in-law, or maybe it's a brother and a sister-in-law – Carol didn't quite catch the relationship. A few Kingdom people have come out to support her, including Sarah.

After Deputy Thomas says his "I do," Santiago waves a hand from the two new council members to the audience and says, "I present to you Councilwoman Dixon and Councilman Mayfield."

Carol's heart seizes when Sweetheart claps right along with the audience, even without Daryl pushing her hands together for her. When the baby's done clapping, Daryl raises her hands over her head in a cheering gesture and whispers something in her ear, which looks like it might be, "Yaaay, Mommy!"

The small audience begins to stand and offer Carol and Thomas their congratulations. Daryl hands Sweetheart off to Carol, kisses her cheek, and whispers, "Damn proud of ya" before disappearing with Dog and Mitch out the door.

"I'll take her," says Shannon, reaching for Sweetheart. "You've got your first council meeting to attend."

[*]

The hunters are talking when they vanish into the woods. "Need a nickname for Carol," Daryl says. "I ain't got one for her, but she's got one for me."

Mitch smirks. "You mean Pooky?"

Daryl flushes. He's not sure when Mitch would have heard that. Carol must say it more often around people than he realized.

"You know where that comes from?" Mitch asks.

"'S just some damn name she made up," Daryl murmurs.

"It was Garfield's teddy b – "

"- Know that!" Daryl interrupts. "Dante told me. That _ain't_ where _she_ got it from, though."

"Well, someone's a _grumpy_ teddy bear."

"Hell ya doin' readin' Garfield for anyhow? 'S gay."

" _I'm_ gay."

Daryl didn't mean to offend, but sometimes he just talks the way he grew up talking. "Didn't mean 's _gay_. Meant…"

Mitch doesn't leave him hanging there. "I had a little sister. You'll see. You're going to be out scavenging all forty-seven volumes of _Garfield_ for Sweetheart one day, and then _you're_ going to read them. Every. Single. One."

"Ain't readin' no damn _Garfield_ books."

Mitch maneuvers around some forest debris. "How about honey? For Carol?"

"Nah. 'S bee throw-up."

"Dear?"

"Nah. I _hunt_ deer."

Mitch rolls his eyes. "D-E-A-R."

"Nah. 'S what old people call each other."

"You _are_ old," Mitch insists. "Aren't you 50?"

"That ain't old! Ain't gonna be long 'til yer 50, ya know."

"Thirteen years."

"Go by in a flash," Daryl assures him.

"Sweetheart?"

"'S my daughter's name!"

"Oh. Yeah. That would be weird now." Mitch shifts his rifle strap on his shoulder. "Baby."

"Nah. Shannon calls Garland that. All the damn time."

"Maybe try a foreign language then. Women love the romance languages. Maybe Spanish. Mi vida. Or Italian. Amore mio. French! Mon Coeur."

"Nah. I'd sound like a pretentious ass."

Mitch sighs as they climb over a fallen tree log. "Beautiful?" he ventures.

"Tried it once. She laughed. 'Cause she don't know how goddamn beautiful she is."

"All the more reason to keep using it," Mitch says.

"Ya think?"

"She'll stop laughing eventually. And even when she's laughing, that doesn't mean she doesn't _like_ it. Maybe she needs to hear she's beautiful. And if you make it her _nickname_ , you can remind her at least once a day without seeming too weird about it."

"Huh. How come ya know so much 'bout women when ya ain't never fucked one?"

"Oh, I have."

Daryl stops walking. "What? _Why_?"

"Just to see. In my early twenties, I tried it twice with two different women. Just to see."

"'N what ya see?"

"That I was still gay."

Daryl shakes his head. "Damn, man! I wouldn't fuck a man _just to see_."

"Maybe you ought to." Mitch grins suggestively. "You don't know what you're missing."

"Shut up," Daryl mutters and hikes on. Dog, who has just now noticed his best friend is no longer by his side, runs back toward him and yips at his heels. "'M comin!" Daryl assures him.

"You're happily married," Mitch says as he falls in step. "But you'd be surprised how many single men have given it a whirl, just to see. Especially in a place like Jamestown, where there's twice as many men as women."

Daryl looks at him skeptically.

Mitch shrugs. "A blowjob's a blow job."

"No. It _ain't_."

Mitch chuckles. "There have been three straight men in Jamestown who have asked me for one."

"Then they ain't straight."

"Well, straight's a relative term," Mitch says. "I said no to two of them."

"Not the third?"

"Well, you know my weakness for a man in uniform. Although in this case, it was just a hat and a deputy star."

Daryl wishes he hadn't asked.

"No one you know," Mitch assures him. "He died in the raid of 5 NE. And he didn't want to reciprocate, so once was enough."

"'S not talk 'bout this."

"Makes you uncomfortable? You try to be cool with it, but you aren't really, are you?"

"Man, I ain't cool with none of that personal shit. Ain't just _yours_. Ain't even cool with m'own."

Mitch laughs. "But you're asking me to help you come up with a nickname for your woman?"

"Ain't like I was askin' ya to name her lady bits." Daryl sees Mitch's amused expression and wishes very much he hadn't said that. Mitch smirks and opens his mouth. "Don't," Daryl warns him. "Don't. Do n-"

"- Mount Pleasant."

Daryl flushes. "Stahp!"

"Pink Pearl."

"Ya don't quit, 'm gonna deck ya."

"Altar of Venus."

Daryl takes a menacing step toward him. Mitch dances away, laughing. "I know! Privy Counsel! Perfect for a former queen!"

"Swear to God, Mitch," Daryl growls, "If ya say one more- "

" – Trembling Quiver! Hahahaha. That one's perfect. She's the quiver to your arrow!"

Daryl lunges for him, and Mitch sidesteps. The skinny hunter is too lithe and quick on his feet. Daryl almost tumbles over in the attempt. He rights himself, glowers, and begins stomping toward Mitch again. Dog, not knowing what's going on, gets in between them, but instead of simply siding with Daryl, he turns back and forth between the two men, barking and jumping up, turning and barking and jumping up again, and driving them apart, Daryl scowling, and Mitch still laughing.

"Heel!" Daryl orders, and Dog reluctantly quiets and sits. "Enough," he tells Mitch.

"Fine. I'll stop. But you're _much_ too easy a target. It's hard to resist."

"Turned my own damn dog against me," Daryl mutters as he begins walking beside Mitch again. Dog trots alongside them.

"He was _half_ on your side."

"What if Mitch was tryin' to kill me?" Daryl asks Dog. "Huh?"

Dog looks up at Daryl, licks his nose innocently, and patters on.

When they reach the bear pit, the branches across the top are undisturbed. Mitch sighs.

"Better luck tomorrow," Daryl mutters. They do find a possum in their cage trap, however.

"Let's feed him corn for a couple of days and clean him out," Mitch suggests. "Then he'll be good in a nice hot chili."

[*]

Sweetheart kneels in the rowboat, bouncing on her knees, and slapping her hand against the side. She squeals at the sound of the metallic ring. Then she inches forward and leans her head over the edge to look down at the water rippling from the oars Carol and Daryl row. She inches forward again and begins to lean even further over the edge.

"No! No! Bad baby!" Daryl drops the oars and snatches her up.

Carol, laughing, says, "She's not a dog, Pookie. Don't call her bad baby. And I _told_ you she needed to stay in the backpack."

"She wanted down," Daryl mumbles as he drags the backpack over and wrangles her into it.

"And you just plan to give her everything she wants, don't you?" Carol teases.

He glowers as he snaps-snaps the pack together and swings it on his back. Carol watches Sweetheart's eyes go wide over his shoulder as she looks out on the scenery. Daryl picks up the oars, and both begin rowing again.

When they arrive on the lighthouse island, while Daryl finishes pulling up the boat and unloading it, Carol sits on the sandy pebble shore with Sweetheart between her legs and lets the little girl slap the water as it laps towards them. "Water," she tells her daughter. "Waaaa-ter."

"Wa-wa-wa-wa," Sweetheart babbles as she slaps it. She falls forward on her hands and pushes up on her knees. Carol lets her crawl two paces into the water before snatching her up again and sitting her on her bottom.

Daryl squats down beside them, his hands closed together. "Hey, Sweetie, look what Daddy found." Sweetheart turns toward the sound of his voice, and he slowly opens his hands to review a tiny toad. It hops out of his hands onto the shore, and Sweetheart lets out a curdling scream. "'S just a toad!" Daryl says anxiously. Now the baby's crying. "Goddamnit," he mutters as Carol stands, plucks Sweetheart up, and cradles her until she's calm. "Can't be afraid of a _toad_. How's she gonna handle walkers?"

"She's nine months old, Daryl."

"Judith wasn't 'fraid of toads."

"I don't know if Judith saw a toad at that age." But Daryl's right. Judith wasn't afraid of much, or maybe she was, but they were all too busy trying to survive to notice it.

Daryl puts Sweetheart back in the pack so they can hike around the little island. Carol keeps glancing up to watch the baby's delight in the scenery. She reaches out her hand to try to touch a Monarch butterfly as it flutters past. They've come south early this year. The baby points to the birds swooping over the river, and the light house rising from its rocky perch.

They find a spot away from the rocks that's flat enough to lay out their blanket and take turns watching Sweetheart while the other one eats, letting her crawl a short distance before bringing her back and setting her on her bottom. She gets a treat of one ounce of apple juice in a sippy cup – Carol's trying her out on it, in preparation for weaning – and some cold oatmeal.

"How was yer council meeting, Beautiful?" Daryl asks.

Carol laughs at the _beautiful_. Where'd _that_ come from? "It was useful. Garland caught us up to speed on the procedures, and we got our schedules for next week's meetings and open town halls. We voted on whether to remove Ana from her appointment as judge. There was some concern she might be prejudiced in the divorce cases she presides over, but I asked if anyone thought she'd been unfair in the past, and they said no. And I asked them if they really want an eighteen-year-old presiding as head judge for the court. So she's staying. But Annette will preside over Ana and Earl's divorce settlement."

"'N the captain? He's stayin' cap'n?"

"Well, no one wants to promote Commander Lawson over him. And his personal failings don't really affect his ability to navigate. The scandal over the affair might make it harder for him to control his men when he's telling them not to be lewd or crude, but…he'll manage it. Ultimately they respect him because he's competent at his job."

It's a quiet afternoon, with no guard yet in the lighthouse, and something miraculous happens, at least, it feels like a little miracle to Carol, because what are the odds that they would _both_ get to witness one of Sweetheart's firsts at the same time? They decide to climb up to the top of the light house to show Sweetheart the view. Daryl sets her down on the barren earth before the staircase while he prepares the backpack to carry her up. She crawls toward the stairs and slaps her palms down on the first one. She pushes herself up in a sort of half raised plank, step-crawls sideways three paces, and grabs the rail. Then she stands straight and squeals.

"'S pulling up!" Daryl cries. "Ain't that pullin' up?"

"She just pulled up," Carol agrees, clapping for Sweetheart. "All by yourself!" she coos. Sweetheart, still holding the rail, bounces in place.

"Told she's a genius!" Daryl cries. "Book says they don't do that 'til eleven months."

"I think it's normal at nine months," Carol tells him. "Sophia was ten months."

"Still, on the early side."

Carol chuckles at his excitement. "Sure, yes, it's on the early side."

"That's m'girl!" Daryl tells her, and claps, and leans down, and says, "Come to Daddy."

Sweetheart babbles and squeals and inches her foot toward Daryl while still holding the rail.

"C'mon now!"

She lets go of the rail, attempts to move her foot, and immediately tumbles forward, but he catches her before she can face plant. "Yaaaay!" he cries, swooping her up and swinging her as he does. "Good job!"


	119. Chapter 119

"Dog!" Gary shouts when the Barron family steps into the Dixon cabin. The preschooler runs straight for the bearskin rug as Dog jumps up and yaps a greeting. It's a giggling, rolling reunion.

The babies and Gary have already been fed, so the adults leave the preschooler to play and use Sweetheart's crib as a playpen for the babies. "He's sitting up?" Carol asks in surprise when Garland plops VanDaryl down on his bottom across from Sweetheart.

"He started doing it yesterday," Garland replies proudly. VanDaryl leans slowly left and falls over on his side. "But not for very long," Garland admits.

As VanDaryl kicks himself onto his stomach, Sweetheart picks up a wooden block from her crib and puts it in front of his face. Sweetheart babbles at him, as if explaining the purpose of the block.

"I swear she's going to say her first word any day now," Shannon says.

"She said wa wa today," Carol tells her, "when we were looking at the river, but I don't think that counts."

VanDaryl plants a hand on the mattress, pushes up his torso, and kicks and kicks, but doesn't quite roll over. He starts to fuss, so Shannon flips him on his back. The baby's blue-green eyes are drawn upward to the mobile Daryl installed over the crib. While Shannon winds it up, Carol puts dinner on the table, and Daryl takes down one of the rifles over the fireplace in response to Garland's request to see it.

"I love the moveable drapes, Carol," Shannon gushes as she joins her to help set the table. "It makes the place look so much bigger than if you had walls." She turns toward Garland. "Baby, maybe we should knock down our walls."

"We're not going to knock down our walls. Why would we do that?"

"It looks crowded in that cabin."

"We have bedrooms with walls and _doors_ , Shannon. Doors we can _lock_. So children don't walk in." He turns over the rifle and says to Daryl, "You know, you can modify this to take a ten-round magazine."

"Boy and their toys." Shannon shakes her head and begins filling glasses with iced tea.

"That rifle's actually mine," Carol says.

"Carol keeps up with her shooting, darling," Garland tells his wife. " _You_ need to get on the range with me again. It's been awhile."

Shannon leans over the table and whispers to Carol, "It's always _been awhile_ with these men, hasn't it?"

Carol chuckles.

"Your wife almost beat me at the quarterly qualifications," Garland tells Daryl. "She had an excellent group."

"Ya still qualify with the sheriff's department?" Daryl asks.

"They let me have a little ammo and join them. Everyone knows I'm going back next July when I can't be mayor anymore."

"Ya gonna be sheriff again?"

"No. Just a deputy. The sheriff can't serve on the council. He has to be independent. And I've still got four years before I run up against the council term limits. I just can't be mayor after this year."

Daryl puts the rifle back up over the fireplace. Gary stands and asks, "Dog go outside pway with me? Pway ball?"

"I don't know, son," Garland says. "Let me check who's out in the neighborhood." Garland walks to the front door, opens it, and steps out. He can be heard hollering. "Harry, keep an eye on my boy for me for a bit while he's out here?" There's an indecipherable response and then Garland shoos Gary out the door with Dog. "When is he going to stop saying his l's and r's like w's?"

"By the time he's six," Shannon replies.

"That late?" Garland asks.

"Or next year. Who knows, baby? But we're not going to worry about it until he's six."

"We're not?"

" _I'm_ not. He's actually extremely articulate for his age."

"Hmmm," Garland murmurs. "I didn't know. I guess I'm just used to how much _you_ talk."

"If my arm was long enough, I'd smack you right now."

Garland smiles. "Well, good thing it's perfectly proportioned, just like the rest of you."

The two couples crowd in around the small kitchen table. "I wanted a bigger table," Carol apologizes, "but it just would have been too crowded for this space."

"It's nice to get _cozy_ with friends," Shannon insists. "I mean everybody already thinks we _are_. _Real_ cozy."

Garland flushes. "I should have Commander Lawson flogged for starting that rumor."

"We don't flog people anymore, baby."

"It's technically still on the books as an option." Garland cuts his venison, takes a bite, and says, "My compliments to the chef."

"Compliments to the hunter, too." Shannon rears back with a surprised look on her face. "When did she start doing _that_?"

Carol turns around in her chair to see that Sweetheart has pulled herself up by the crib rail and is standing and bouncing in place.

"'S afternoon," Daryl says proudly. "Book says it's early."

"Wait until she's climbing out," Garland warns. "You won't be so excited then."

"It's beautiful to see." Shannon resumes cutting her venison. "Especially when we weren't sure if she'd have developmental delays with those weeks of poor nutrition."

Garland sets his iced tea back on the table. "At this rate, she'll take her first steps before the trade trip, and you won't have to worry about missing them."

"What?" asks Daryl, mid chew.

Carol was so excited about getting on the council that she forgot to tell Daryl. "The council approved the trade trip. But Garland doesn't think we should bring Sweetheart."

"Well, fuck that, we're bringin' 'er. Gotta meet Henry 'n Judith 'n Hershey 'n 'Chonne. Aaron. Tara. Jerry. She's gonna love Jerry."

"Daryl…" Garland cautions, "a baby? For up to five or six days on a ship? With a crew full of loud sailors, out there on a route we've never sailed before, where you might encounter pirates or barriers?"

"Hell, she survived with Raul for two weeks roamin' in the wilderness," Daryl reasons.

Garland scratches the back of his head and looks across the table at Shannon. "Help me out here."

Shannon spears a carrot with her fork. "I do not get between parents and their parenting decisions. That does not win anyone friends."

Garland sighs. "Well, the council will have to approve."

"Carol's on the council now," Daryl murmurs.

"The _entire_ council has to approve the passenger and crew list. So it won't be up to Carol _or_ up to me alone. Think about it. You have time."

"Ain't nothin' to think 'bout. Ain't leavin' m'girl for over a week."

"Well, if you change your mind," Garland says, "or the council doesn't approve, you know our door is always open to our goddaughter."

Shannon leans forward confidentially. "Garland has no problem volunteering _me_ to babysit is what he means."

Carol smiles.

"I'll help, too, Shannon. I help with the boys."

" _Help_. Did you catch that?" Shannon asks Carol.

Carol nods.

Garland looks at Daryl. "What did I say wrong?"

"Got me, man, but ya better 'pologize, 'cause yer wife looks pissed."

"Garland, baby, you don't _help_ with your own kids. That implies they aren't _your_ responsibility to begin with, that they're all _my_ responsibility, and that whatever you do is just gravy."

"How would you prefer I describe it? Clearly I don't work as hard as you do at home."

"No shit, Sherlock."

"But I earn eighty percent of the household rations," Garland says. "You work harder in the home, I work harder outside of it. It's a strategic division of labor. I thought you were happy with that?"

"I _am_ happy with our arrangement. It was my choice to scale back on outside work for VanDaryl's first year. Just don't say you're _helping_ with your own children."

"What should I say?" Garland asks.

"That you're _fathering_ them."

"Very well. I _father_ the boys. And if we have her for a week, I'll _godfather_ Sweetheart. Better?"

Shannon shrugs. "Marginally."

Daryl smirks. "Sounds like someone ain't gettin' laid tonight."

"Oh, he still has time to play his cards right," Shannon says. "The night is young. Gary has finally accepted sleeping in his old bedroom again. He hasn't come into ours for two nights. And VanDaryl slept through the night."

"Already?" Carol asks enviously. Sweetheart just started sleeping through the night not that long ago.

"Seven hours straight. I am surprisingly _refreshed_. " She smiles at Garland. "That and Garland brought me wildflowers this afternoon, so he's hasn't lost all his points for the day."

"Points?" Daryl asks.

"Oh, every woman has a point system, Daryl," Shannon assures him. "But she's not necessarily going to tell you what it is."

Daryl looks at Carol. "I got points?"

Carol laughs. "You have _a lot_ of points after that picnic you planned."

"You can lose them at any time, though," Garland cautions him, "without warning, and without explanation."

"Use that detective's brain of yours, baby, and the explanation will be apparent."

"Then again, sometimes I _earn_ points and don't even know why," Garland admits. "I need a guide of some kind, like a market price list."

"Garland, if I have to _tell_ you to do something, that automatically makes it worth only half the points."

"Half is better than having to guess what you want, my love." He gestures to his plate with his fork. "Carol, what did you do to these carrots? They're outstanding."

"I used the recipe Shannon gave me."

Shannon raises an eyebrow. "Do you mean to imply, Garland, that they're not as good when _I_ make them?"

"Aw, man," Daryl says through a chuckle, "think ya just lost a whole bunch of points there."

Shannon turns her attention to Carol. "I'm glad you're on the council now. I mean, I'm not glad about what happened to Earl. Garland's downright livid." She turns back to Garland. "Isn't that why you got Ana and the captain kicked off the council, baby?"

"The vote was unanimous," Garland replies.

"Yes, but who got the ball rolling on that vote? A little sweet revenge for your old friend Earl's sake?"

"Actually…" Garland replies, spearing a carrot, "revenge never entered my mind. I was concerned about the distraction the scandal would cause the work of the council, of course, but I also think that if Earl and Ana decide to try to patch things up, it's going to be impossible if she and the captain are working closely together. Outside of the council, they don't often run into each other. I mean, if they aren't _trying_ to."

"Patch things up?" Shannon asks in disbelief.

"Pfft," Daryl agrees. "They ain't gonna patch things up."

"You never know," Garland says. "The wound's tender and fresh right _now_. But there's a baby. And Earl does love Ana."

"Garland!" Shannon exclaims. "If I was screwing around with some other man, and I was possibly knocked up with _his_ child, would _you_ want to patch things up?"

"I honestly don't know," he says. "We have two children. And I have to admit: I've grown fond of you."

Shannon rolls her eyes. "So you'd stay with me for the sake of the kids?"

"I'd be angry. Hurt. Upset. Betrayed. It would rip my heart apart, but I wouldn't necessarily walk away from it all without at least _trying_ to salvage it."

"Mhm. Well, I _would_ ," Shannon murmurs, "if it was the other way around and you'd knocked up some other woman. Just so you know."

"Duly noted. How about you, Carol? Would you walk away from Daryl in that situation, not even try to patch it up?"

"I don't know. I can't envision the situation. It would mean Daryl wasn't Daryl."

"Exactly," Shannon says. "You can't really envision me cheating on you, can you, baby?"

"No. But I don't think Earl envisioned Ana cheating on him either. No one _envisions_ it."

"There had to be signs," Shannon insists. "As friendly as she and David were with each other? Earl just wasn't paying attention."

"The captain's friendly with a lot of people," Garland reasons. "He's friendly with you."

"That's because _I'm_ friendly, baby. You should try it sometime."

Van Daryl begins to fuss just as they finish up dinner. Sweetheart is standing up again in the crib, and she looks down at him with a furrowed brow and serious expression, as though to say – _What is this mewling creature going on about?_

Shannon goes to get the baby and pop him on her breast. Meanwhile, Carol clears the empty dishes to the soaking tub. Garland thanks her and then turns to Daryl. Tapping his front pocket, he says. "I won some cigars in a poker game last week. You want to go out front and smoke them? Keep an eye on Gary?"

"Can't smoke. M'gonna want to keep smokin'. But I'll come with."

The men disappear and Carol leaves the dishes soaking in the plastic tub, takes Sweetheart out of the crib, and sets her on the bearskin rug with a ring stacking toy. Shannon has taken the chair and is nursing VanDaryl, so Carol settles on the couch and asks, "Why is it so important to Garland that we not bring Sweetheart to Oceanside?"

"As mayor, he'd feel responsible if anything happened to her. He'll feel responsible if anything happens to anyone, but he couldn't forgive himself a baby. He worries too much. About Jamestown. About its citizens. He's got a weight on his shoulders he just lugs around all day long. I know he's good at what he does, and I know the next mayor probably isn't going to be as good, but I'll be glad when his term is up and he can't run again."

"Who do you think will be mayor next year?"

"I always thought it would be the captain, but with this mess, who knows. He's off the council this year, but because he resigned before being formally removed, he _can_ run again next year. And the public will probably have forgiven him by then. But maybe it will be Dr. Ahmad. Hell, maybe it'll be _me_ ," Shannon says jokingly. "I could always run for council again next year. VanDaryl will be weaned."

"You _should_ run again," Carol says. "I can tell you miss the politicking."

"Only if I can talk Garland into taking a year off from the council. We survived that year together, both of us on it, but it's not good, working that closely with your spouse. Trust me. You shouldn't shit where you eat."

Carol laughs. "So I should be glad Daryl took his name off the ballot?"

"For more reasons that that," Shannon says. "They would have elected him, legend that he is. And he would have _hated_ it. All the meetings."

"He would have. He was on our council at one of our early camps, but it only met when necessary, and it wasn't much of a government. There was certainly no paperwork. I can't envision Daryl doing paperwork." And then suddenly Carol does, and she laughs, because the image is so incongruous.

Sweetheart slams a plastic ring down on the rug and laughs, too, a tittering laugh that peters off when Carol's does.

"That's so cute," Shannon says. "She doesn't even know why you're laughing. She just wanted to join in."

"I can't leave her for ten days," Carol says. "She'll forget me."

"She won't forget you. Does Oceanside have any ships?"

"They have rowboats. Canoes. A small sailboat. Nothing like Jamestown's ships."

"How many people could fit on that sailboat?"

"Twelve maybe," Carol speculates. "Seven with cargo."

"Maybe Henry and those other people you mentioned could sail to Jamestown in the spring, after we've established the route, made sure it's navigable and clear of barriers and enemies. They could come to trade with us. Then your son and friends could meet Sweetheart. They could stay a week. We'd put them up in the barracks. They'll be empty once the dorm is up."

"I'll talk to Daryl about it."

When she's done nursing VanDaryl, Shannon gives Sweetheart her nighttime feeding – she's down to one in the morning and one in the evening, now. It's another half hour before the men come in with Dog and Gary, and by then VanDaryl is asleep and Sweetheart is rubbing her eyes. The Barrons say their thank you's and head home, and Daryl puts Sweetheart to bed while Carol finishes up the dishes.

He pulls the drapes when the baby's settled, and Carol says, "Will you take out this dirty water and dump it?"

"Mmmhm."

He returns with the empty tub just as she's putting the last dried dish in the hutch. He sets the tub on the table, wraps his arms around her from behind, and nuzzles her neck. "Ya smell good."

"I smell like dish soap."

Daryl kisses her shoulder. "Smells good."

"I guess anything smells good to a man who wants sex." She turns and wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him. After pulling back, she says, "I thought a man's libido was supposed to slow down when he hit fifty."

"Think mine sped up when I started hittin' you."

Carol groans. "Terrible, terrible line, Pookie."

"How many points did it lose me?"

She laughs. "No loss. You have plenty of points. But I'm tired, and I just want to cuddle and go to bed. You can poke me awake in the morning."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." She kisses him again and then pulls away.

They curl onto the couch and discuss whether or not to bring Sweetheart on the journey to Oceanside. "It _would_ mean weaning her a month early, because Shannon's not coming," Carol says. "And we'd have to bring enough cow's milk for a week. And store it in such a way as to keep. I guess didn't really think this through."

"Guess Garland's right," Daryl mutters. "She's safer here. I could stay back with 'er, though. If ya want."

"But you want to see Hershel, I know. Aaron and Michonne and Tara." Those are the people he still most cares about in the alliance. So many old friends are dead and gone now. "And your bike."

"Think I can bring the bike _back_?" he asks with sudden excitement. "Got that big ship to put it on."

"Probably. But didn't you give it to Aaron?"

"To _hold_. Not to _keep_."

"I think he probably assumed it was to keep."

"I bet he don't even ride it," Daryl grumbles. "Could buy it back off 'em."

Carol chuckles. "Well, you two work that out when we go. Because _we're_ going. Together. _Both_ of us." Carol sighs. "I wish I had a functioning camera. We could at least bring a photo of her to show Henry."

"Get Deputy Andrew to draw 'er. He drew us for the museum. 'N we looked pretty damn bad ass in those sketches."

Carol smiles. It's a perfect idea, she thinks. "I'll ask him tomorrow."

They head to bed early. It's too warm to spoon tonight, so they roll with their backs pressed together, as the breeze from the ceiling fan circles round them.


	120. Chapter 120

The sex begins lazily, at sunrise, with gentle caresses from behind, playful toying, and nibbling kisses. It proceeds lazily, with Carol straddling her husband and whimpering as she eases herself gently onto his erection. He holds her steady with a hand on each of her hips, watches her languid movements eagerly, and calls her Beautiful as she takes her slow pleasure. But then Sweetheart wakes up.

Fortunately, Carol is more than halfway to her climax when the sound of the baby's happy babbling drifts through the drapes. She falls forward over Daryl and braces herself with her palms on the mattress so she can rock faster. Letting go of his restraint, Daryl slaps both of his hands on her ass for perch and pushes up into her, hard. Their chorused panting grows heavier as the bed creeks. Carol buries her final moan against his shoulder, but Daryl's groan of "Awwwww fuuuuuuck yeaaaaah" is unmuffled.

Sweetheart must hear. She squeals and then babbles suddenly louder, her nonsensical string of "La la la babba wa wa wa la ba" becoming "dada dada dada dada."

With Carol collapsed against his chest, Daryl asks, "Did ya hear that?"

"Hear what?" Carol slides off him and then sitting up.

"She said dada."

"Lalawa da da muh-muh," Sweetheart babbles, "Ba wa wa LAA ma ma ma EEE da da da la wa."

"I don't think she means it yet, Pookie. She's just babbling. They don't really start saying words with meaning until about twelve months."

He frowns. Sweetheart squeals again and the babbling grows even louder. "Be there in a sec, Sweetie!" calls Daryl, but then he yawns.

"Do you want me to get her?" Carol asks.

"Mhmmm…." Daryl murmurs as his eyes droop shut. "Wake me in twenty."

When Carol does wake him up, Sweetheart is freshly diapered and dressed in a striped black and white onesie that makes her look like she just busted out of jail. Daryl sits up and rubs his eyes before she puts the baby in his arms. "I have morning patrol and then I need to do the laundry so we're not resorting to the prison onesie. Drop her at Shannon's before you go hunting. She needs to nurse."

"M'naked under this sheet."

"Well, get dressed."

"Should take 'er while I get dressed."

"I have to go. She's a _baby_ , Daryl. You can get dressed in front of her." Carol looks at his dubious expression, sighs, and plucks Sweetheart back up and takes her behind the drapes, muttering, "Hurry up."

Daryl has his crossbow on his back and Dog at his side when he takes Sweetheart to the Barron cabin. When the door is open, Dog patters inside barking and runs to lick Gary. It seems Dog has missed his puppy.

Gary giggles and scratches Dog behind the ears while Sweetheart holds her arms out to Shannon spluttering an "mmmmmm" sound.

"Maybe her first word is going to be milk," Shannon says as she takes the baby from him.

"Nah. Was dada. Said it today."

"Really?" Shannon asks skeptically.

"Well, don't think she meant it. She was kind of bablin'."

Shannon smiles. "Gary's first word was baby. Probably because I call Garland that so much." She carries Sweetheart over to the rocking chair and precedes to unbutton her shirt. Daryl looks away and sees Van Daryl dangling in a jumper attached to the door frame of Gary's bedroom. The infant bounces up and down, his little bare feet on the floor and then off them and then on them again. "Hey, buddy," Daryl says and walks over and crouches down. He takes his little hand and pretends to shake it. VanDaryl smiles, but he doesn't squeal or laugh the way Sweetheart would. "'S a quiet baby."

"Oh, yeah, very quiet," Shannon says. "Garland was worried he was stupid for a while, and then I reminded him VanDaryl's hit all his milestones on or ahead of schedule. He just takes after his daddy. Calm and serious, but you can tell from that wry little smile of his he'll have that quiet humor, too."

Daryl takes the baby's dangling legs, pulls them down until his feet touch the floor, and then lets go. VanDaryl gives him that sneaky little smile but makes no other noise as he bounces lightly in the door frame. "Yer gonna make a good hunter, kid. _Stealthy_." He stands.

"Will you drop Gary at preschool for me on your way out?"

"Sure thing."

"No!" Gary yells and stomps his foot. "No skoowl. Pway with Dog!"

"Mama needs you to go to school, Gary. Very much. I've got two babies to watch all morning and afternoon."

Daryl, less embarrassed now that Shannon is completely covered by the baby, walks over to the mantle and lays some tobacco in a folded-up piece of paper on it. "'S for the baby sittin'."

"Thank you. Although you don't have to."

"Like hell we don't." Shannon only works five hours a week in the communal gardens. If Garland's not going to work his ass off, they need to be able to trade for more rations.

"You're right, I was just being polite. We do need the money. And I _am_ providing you with a valuable service."

"Damn right. Couldn't work otherwise. C'mon, Gare."

"No! Stay and pway! Me and Dog pway!"

"Dog's goin' huntin' with me."

"I go hwunting with you."

"Nah. I don't think yer mama's gonna let you just yet. When yer five, maybe."

"Seven," Shannon says.

Daryl winks at Gary and whispers, "Five."

Gary giggles. Daryl whistles to Dog, who stops running circles around Gary and comes to Daryl. Gary runs and grabs his little Spiderman backpack and shrugs into it as Daryl opens the door. "Ya know who Spiderman was?" Daryl asks him as they walk out.

"Yeah," Gary says. "He woke for Daddy."

"Woke for 'em?"

"Woked for him! Woked! In the po-weese."

"At the Richmond Police Department?"

"Yes," Gary confirms.

Daryl suppresses a laugh. "Oh, yeah. That's right. Forgot 'bout that. Yer daddy was bad ass, huh, being Spiderman's boss?"

"And Batman!"

"Mhmhm," Daryl plays along "Aquaman, too."

Gary cackles. "Silly Unca Dahwall! Awkaman's not weal!"

[*]

When Carol pops into one of the barns to investigate a report of a surreptitiously milked cow, there's a scuffling in the loft above. She stands back and unsnaps her holster before resting a palm on the butt of her handgun, just to be safe. It's only the blacksmith's apprentice, Jeremy, the one who applied before the council for early marriage. He must be on his stomach, but she can see his head, peering over the ledge at her. He lowers it the second she spies him, as if trying to hide.

"Jeremy," she says, "what are you doing up there?"

He raises his head again. "Uh…just…you know…um…looking for some iron. For horseshoes."

"In the loft?"

There's whispering and Jeremy makes a shushing sound. Clearly someone else is up there in the hay below the ledge whom Carol can't see. "Someone was milking a cow last night," she says, "after curfew, and without permission. Do you want to come down and talk to me about that?"

Olivia sits up in the loft. She's holding a blanket up to her neck to cover her chest.

"Why don't you two get dressed and come down from there?"

There's some more rustling, pulling on of clothes beneath the mask of the ledge. Jeremy scrambles down first and then helps Olivia down. Jeremy turns to face Carol, but Olivia shyly buries her face against his shoulder. "We're married now," Jeremy says. "Officially. We just don't have our own place until those dorms are built. I don't know about any milk, I swear. I was in the barracks after curfew. Olivia was at widow Williams's hut. We just came here this morning. It's our day off today, and we just didn't have anywhere else to _go_."

"The barn's not the safest place for you two to be rolling around when she's pregnant," Carol cautions them gently. "The barn cats go up there, and cat feces can contain a parasite that causes toxoplasmosis infection."

Jeremy looks suddenly alarmed. "Tox what?"

"If you get it, it can spread to the baby and cause miscarriage."

Olivia jerks her head up from Jeremy's shoulder and looks at him with wide eyes. "I didn't know!" he tells her.

"I don't mean to scare you," Carol says. "It's very rare. I'm sure you're fine, just…find another place. Can't you _both_ stay at Mrs. Williams's hut until the dorm is built?"

"She doesn't like me," Jeremy says. "For getting Olivia pregnant, and, well, because Olivia's moving out."

"I'll still stop by and help her!" Olivia insists. "And her neighbors will, too."

"Well, maybe I can talk to her," Carol suggests. "Maybe she'd be willing to let you stay."

"There's no privacy in that hut anyway," Jeremy says.

"Find another place," Carol repeats. "Not the loft."

"Yes, ma'am," Jeremy replies. "Mrs. Dixon. I mean. Deputy. Deputy Dixon. Councilwoman."

"Carol's fine."

The teenage couple leaves, and Carol resumes her investigation. The dairy cows that are sometimes kept in this barn at night are out grazing now. One of the cows, Gunther says, was clearly milked because there was a semi-fresh ring of milk lingering in a tin bucket he knew he'd cleaned, and old Bessie was "worked up," as he put it.

Whoever did the milking made a mess of it. Carol can see that – darkened spots on the earth where the milk missed the bucket, and scuffling hoof marks. It looks like the cow moved around a lot and the milker couldn't keep it still. She takes a look at the bucket and touches the ring of milk. She sets the bucket down, examines the milking stool, and then studies the boot prints all over the ground.

"See what I mean, deputy?" Gunther walks into the barn and leans against an empty stall, one hand in the side pocket of his denim overalls, and his farmer's hat tipped up on his forehead. He's chewing on a piece of straw.

"What time did you come in to milk?"

"About 5 a.m."

"That early?"

"It's the only way to get in two milkings a day. We do 5 a.m. and 5 p.m."

"You didn't notice any teenagers in the loft?"

"No. But I'm aware that loft does get its fair share of visitors."

Carol chuckles. That means the kids weren't up there all night. They're probably telling the truth, that they came in the morning, sometime after Gunther led the cows out to graze. "Was Jeremy in the barracks last night all night?"

"As far as I know, but I slept soundly, why?" When she doesn't answer, Gunther looks up. "Ah." He shakes his head. "They shouldn't be rolling around in a barn when she's pr – "

"- I told them. They'll find someplace else."

"The laundry room used to be a favored spot, but Dwight and Sherry live there now."

Carol gestures with a finger to some prints. "Are these your boots?"

Gunther strolls over. "They are."

She points to another set of partial prints. "These are a woman's." She's watched Daryl track often enough that she's picked up a few things about size and gait in human footprints. She's not as skilled as he is, but she can figure that much out from these clear prints.

Gunther looks at the ground. "Didn't even notice those."

"Well, it's not your job to notice. Given the mess, whoever did the milking doesn't seem too experienced. Is there any way to know how much she got?"

"Bessie typically gives about four gallons a milking, but that's after a full twelve hours rest. And as she was inexperienced, I can't imagine she got more than two."

"Still, that's over three weeks' rations for an individual. I think I can rule out any of your farmhands with experience milking. Can you give me a list of the female ones?"

"Sure. I've got another hour of work, and I need to check my logs to recall some names. Why don't we grab an early lunch at the tavern later when it opens, and I can dictate that list to you?"

It seems like a harmless enough suggestion on its surface, but Daryl's concern that Gunther is attracted to her puts the proposal in a more cautionary light. "I have laundry to do. Just write it up for me and leave it at the jailhouse in the inbox on top of that little filing cabinet."

"But you have to eat," Gunther reasons. "Might as well kill two birds with one stone and make it a working lunch. If it's a cost issue, I'm happy to pay."

Now the suggestion seems suddenly _less_ harmless. "I really don't have time, Gunther, but I appreciate the offer."

"Suit yourself."

"I usually do."

[*]

The list is waiting for her in the inbox on top of the filing cabinet when she finishes her patrol rounds. Earl is in the jailhouse, at the small wooden table, paging through a file. She almost doesn't recognize him, because his familiar handlebar mustache and soul patch are gone. "You shaved."

Earl shuts the file folder. "I only grew it for Ana in the first place. She said I'd look like Wyatt Earp."

"Well, you look better without it," Carol assures him. "I see you got a haircut, too. I almost didn't recognize you when I walked in."

He's not wearing his sheriff's hat anymore, and he runs a hand over his short, jet black hair. "Candy said it would bring out my Italian cheekbones."

Carol raises an eyebrow. "Candy? Earl, I hope – "

"- I never went to the whorehut when it was open. I'm not going to start cavorting now with the only whore left in town. She gave me the haircut in exchange for a pint of brew."

"Ah."

"But I do know Candy's trading sexual favors for booze again. I don't guess there's much that can be done about it. She calls it _dating_ , and really, who's to argue? Isn't that what half of relationships are in the end? A transactional exchange? You build me a cabin and play father to my child, and I'll pretend to love you."

"Earl, don't let what happened with you and Ana make you jaded for life. You may still find a meaningful relationship one day."

He makes a doubtful noise.

She points to the file he closed. "Aren't you on administrative leave?" Apparently no one made him turn in his keys to the filing cabinet.

"I know. I'm headed to do my four hours in the fields this afternoon. I just had to grab some old time logs to give to my divorce lawyer. I worked a lot of overtime right before I married Ana in exchange for supplies from the communal warehouse, so I could build us a cabin. If I can prove all the time I worked, I might have a better chance of winning the cabin, or at least of getting more of our collective ammo in compensation."

Carol plucks Gunther's list out of the inbox. "Who has the cabin now?"

"She does. And I can't even go back to the old hut I lived in before I built the cabin, because my old roommate got himself a new roommate with the last group of refugees that came in before your people. So I'm crashing in the museum for the time being. On the library floor. But I roll up my sleeping bag and tuck away my gear and stay out of it during open hours."

"I'm sorry, Earl. That's unfortunate." She almost feels moved to offer to let him sleep on their couch, but she's too jealous of her time with her family to invite him into their sphere. And the library is not a bad temporary quarters. There's electricity and an actual bathroom with running water down the hallway, instead of the outhouse she and Daryl share with a neighboring family, or the handpump they share with _four_ neighboring families. In fact, the council should consider turning the library into a bedroom and moving the library books into the theater instead. It's a waste of valuable private space. She makes a note to suggest that at the next meeting.

"What's that?" Earl nods to the list in her hand.

"Oh, just a list of _non_ -suspects. Someone milked a cow last night and stole the milk. A woman, by the looks of the footprints, and not an experienced milker."

"Well," Earl slides his folder off the table. "Good luck, deputy."

Carol does a few interviews of people who live in the cabins not far form the barn in question, but she doesn't get any leads. She shelves the case for the time being and does the laundry in the river. Daryl's _dairy girls_ – Cassie and Autumn – are there, doing their own laundry, so Carol seizes the opportunity to ask them their opinion on the case.

"Gosh, I don't know," Cassie replies as she scrubs her husband's boxers against a washboard. Carol tries not to think of the woman flirting with _her_ husband. "What a strange thing! To steal milk straight from the cow."

"Kind of clever, actually," says Autumn. "It's less likely to be noticed missing. Normally I'd just think production had slowed if a cow gave a gallon or two less than usual. How did you even know?"

"There was evidence."

"You don't suspect _us_ , do you?" Cassie gasps.

"No. I'm looking for an inexperienced milker."

"Hey," Cassie turns to Autumn, "who was that woman Ernesto took off the milking rotation because she kept screwing up? Ruby?"

"Yeah, that was Ruby."

Carol files the name away. Later, when she's hanging her clothes on one of the lines back in the fort, Deputy Andrew walks by on his patrol. She stops him to ask if he'd be willing to make a sketch of Sweetheart in exchange for a few rounds of ammo, and he agrees to stop by tomorrow afternoon to draw her. Her laundry basket now empty, Carol heads happily home.

[*]

Sweetheart sits in her wooden highchair, blowing raspberry noises and banging a plastic sippy cup of water against the tray. Carol already fed her some mashed carrots, and she'll nurse from Shannon before bed, but for now, she's amusing herself well enough.

"So ya think this Ruby woman done it?" Daryl asks as he pops a bite of ham into his mouth.

"I don't know. I'll talk to her tomorrow. This may become one of the great unsolved mysteries of Jamestown."

"Pffft," Daryl huffs.

"Along with the vanishing strawberries. You wouldn't happen to know anything about _that_ , would you?"

"Ya said the squirrels got 'em."

"I know the squirrels got some," Carol agrees. "I could see the bite marks on some half-eaten ones, but today I _saw_ you snag one when you were coming home."

"Ya did?"

"Out the window. There's a clear line of sight to old Mrs. Conway's garden."

"Well, they were just sittin' there! 'N I only did it the once."

"Really?" Carol asks skeptically as she spears a piece of roasted potato.

"Well, maybe once before."

"Daryl! I'm a deputy and a councilwoman. I can't have my husband pilfering strawberries."

"Three. I took _three_ strawberries," he grumbles. "Total. 'N they were all over-ripe anyhow. They was just gonna rot. She doesn't pick 'em on time."

It's true. Mrs. Conway is sixty-nine, and she lives alone in that tiny one-room cabin, which is original to the fort. She's of sound mind and able-bodied, and she works for her own rations by sorting and organizing food in the communal pantry, but she doesn't really keep up with the garden she's created.

"Well, _don't_ do it again," Carol insists, "or I _will_ have to arrest you."

Daryl grins. "Oh yeah? Is that yer kink?"

Carol smiles. "Look at you. Being all flirty."

"Told ya I got game."

"Pffffffffffffffffffft!" blows Sweetheart, and chucks her cup right onto the table, where it rolls forward and hits Daryl's plate.

Carol laughs. "Not even your daughter believes that." She picks up the cup, scolds, "No! We don't throw!" and puts it back on Sweetheart's tray. "At least I know you didn't steal the milk."

"Didn't steal the strawberries neither. Ya know I spent an hour there week 'fore last, fixin' shit 'round her cabin. 'N she didn't even offer me a drink. Figured she owes me least three strawberries."

"She didn't offer you _anything_ for that?"

"Just told me I should cut m'hair," he grumbles.

"Well don't. I like this length. Not too long, not too short. Something to run my fingers through, but it stays out of your eyes. Promise me you won't cut it."

"A'right, Beautiful. Promise I won't." Daryl picks up his glass and takes a sip.

Carol chuckles. "What's with all the beautifuls lately?"

"S yer new name." The glass clinks back down on the table. "Get used to it."


	121. Chapter 121

**A/N:** My novel "Roots that Clutch" is on a Kindle Countdown Deal for 67% off today through August 19. If you're interested, go over to Amazon and search for "Molly Taggart Roots that Clutch."

[*]

Carol interviews Ruby in the morning, and a few others, but still feels like she's none the wiser about who secretly milked the cow. Now she's home and sitting in the armchair while Sweetheart drums with the palm of her hands on the overturned pot on the bearskin rug.

"She's real cute," Deputy Andrew says as his pencil flies across the page of the sketch pad. He's sitting on the couch as he draws her. "Trisha wants to have a baby."

"Are you two getting married?" Carol asks.

"Oh, we did. Last week. Nothing formal. Just put our names in the book." He angles the pad, and the pencil makes a flicking sound over the thick paper. "She was always my favorite at the whorehut."

"Mhmhm." Carol tries to make that mhmmm sound as nonjudgmental as possible. He's agreed to draw the picture, after all, and from the few peeks she's taken, it seems like he's doing an excellent job of it.

"If I'd have known she would _marry_ me, we could have just done that from the start. But I thought she was just pretending to like me."

Trisha probably _was_ pretending to like him, Carol thinks. If Candy is right, perhaps she still is. Despite her advice to Earl not to be cynical, it seems likely to Carol that Trisha has determined – _Here's a man who will protect me, put a roof over my head, work for my rations when I can't, and he won't beat me. And that's good enough for me._ "Is she still waitressing?"

"Oh, yeah. I'm not going to work her twenty for her. I mean, not until she gets pregnant. Then she'll stop waitressing for a year or two." Sweetheart stops banging on the pot and begins crawling away. "Can you reset the subject?" Andrew asks.

Carol laughs at the phrasing, but plucks Sweetheart up, plops her on her bottom before the pot, and drums on it again to get her interested. Then Carol steps out of the frame.

Carol's pleased with the final product. She can't wait to show the sketch to Daryl, and then to everyone at the trade fair in November, and finally to frame it and hang it on the cabin wall. "You're _really_ talented."

"I went to art school, believe it or not. I majored in drawing and illustration. But the jobs weren't exactly knocking down my door. So I took whatever work I could find. That's how I ended up doing police sketches. That's how I first met Garland. Before the Great Sickness. Funny how we both ended up in Jamestown. He got here a year later than me, but he was so glad to see a familiar face."

That might explain how Andrew became a deputy, despite not being the most competent of the crew. He's not terrible at his job, but he's not particularly good at either. He tends to get distracted on patrol. "So, three bullets?" Carol asks and heads to get her ammo out of the locked chest to pay for the sketch.

"Or two cups of milk, if you've got it. Trisha's been wasting ours on Deputy Tabby. She likes to set out little milk dishes for that damn cat. And then she drinks a lot of it herself, too. Apparently she substituted it when she was trying to quit drinking. I guess it worked. I never thought I'd have to keep a woman in milk. Shoes, sure. But milk?"

"Is that so?" Carol asks innocently as she goes to check their igloo cooler. "Well, I think I can spare two cups."

[*]

"She stole milk to feed the damn cat?" Daryl asks in disbelief just before dipping his spoon into his stew.

"And herself," Carol says. "Though I don't know that for sure. I _suspect_. I'm waiting until the tavern closes to go talk to her."

"'M gonna be asleep when ya get back."

"I know. You're hunting early." Carol reaches out and sets Sweetheart's sippy cup upright. She's not taking to it well, and Carol thinks they might need to go back to the bottle between her morning and evening breast feedings to make sure she stays hydrated.

"Trisha don't seem like a thief."

"Yeah, well, neither do you," Carol teases. "Strawberry snatcher." She gave Mrs. Conway six strawberries this morning from their rations, which is the fine for theft – double what you stole. Daryl's right - Mrs. Conway owes him far more than the three strawberries he snuck for all the help he's given her, but Carol feels that if she's going to be a deputy, she should make sure her household doesn't appear to be dishonoring the law.

"Pffft. Anythin' goes missin', 'm the _first_ guy people suspect."

"Not anymore," Carol assures him. "I don't want it to be Trisha. I like her. It seems like she's been trying to make something of herself. She quit prostituting. She became a waitress. She stopped drinking."

"Yer job sucks sometimes." Daryl pushes his now empty bowl of stew aside. "Sorry, Beautiful."

Carol doesn't laugh this time at the nickname. She smiles indulgently instead. The truth is, it's growing on her.

Daryl picks up the jar of mashed carrots. He feeds Sweetheart a small spoonful, and the baby hums.

[*]

Carol waits until three minutes before closing to go to the tavern, and she turns the sign to CLOSED on her way in. Trisha is already setting up chairs on the tables to better sweep the floor, and Candy is drying glasses behind the bar. The only lingering customer is, unsurprisingly, Gunther, who shouts a "Hello, Carol" from the bar, where he's playing backgammon with Madam Linda.

Carol gives him a brief wave. There's a cup of coffee – or maybe tea - sitting on the bar beside him. The steam rises up and curls toward the loft. It seems Linda has been successful in nagging him off the booze, at least in her presence.

Before Trisha can put up the next chair, Carol says, "Leave it. Take a seat. I need to talk to you for a minute."

"Me?" Trisha asks anxiously. "Why me?"

"Just have a seat."

The waitress slides nervously into the chair, and Carol takes the seat across from her. They're far from the bar, but she keeps her voice low anyway as she begins to ask questions. They talk beneath the clatter of dice shaking in a wooden cup and clop-clopping across the backgammon board.

It doesn't take long for Trisha to admit she stole the milk. She breaks down into a tearful confession. It turns out Andrew worked an hour to buy her _extra_ , above the usual rations, and then when she was pouring a little into a dish for Deputy Tabby, she accidentally dropped and spilled the entire bottle. "And it was one of the big ones! Two quarts!" Over of a quart of it ran out and soaked into the ground. Trisha was terrified Andrew was going to be upset with her when he found out. "We _just_ got married. And he's been so sweet to me. I didn't want to ruin it right out the gate!"

So she snuck out at three a.m. to milk the cow. She'd heard Gunther talk about milking often enough at the bar, so she had an idea of when would be a good time to do it – before Gunther got there for the morning milking, but after the cows had several hours to rest and replenish. It wasn't as easy as she thought. She made a mess but managed to get the two quarts to replace what she spilled. "That's all I took! I swear. I didn't take more than that. Well…I may have lost half a quart on the ground." Trisha swipes at her eyes with the dishcloth that hangs from her belt.

By now, Gunther has wandered from the bar to the table. "What's going on over here?" he asks, looking with concern at Trisha's tear-stained face.

"Gunther," Carol says, "I'm conducting a – "

But Trisha interrupts, spluttering out her confession and apology to him through a renewed set of tears, and concluding, "I don't want Andrew to know! He's going to kick me to the curb!"

"Shhh…" Gunther squeezes her shoulder. "Calm _down_ , darlin'. It's going to be just fine. Andrew would be a fool to let you go." He yanks a white, cloth handkerchief from his front pocket and hands it to her. "And stop using that dirty towel. This is clean."

"Thank you," she murmurs as she takes his handkerchief and dabs her eyes.

"Go on and help Candy with the glasses," Gunther says gently. "I need to talk to Carol for just a second."

Trisha scoots back her chair, rises, and heads over to the bar, still dabbing her eyes. Gunther watches her until she's on the other side of the tavern, and then he sits down in her empty chair facing Carol. He runs a hand across his mouth and sighs. "Help her out here."

"Gunther, I'm very sympathetic. But I can't _not_ charge her. Not for something like this. If it was _your_ milk, you could just decline to press charges. But it's community property. It involved sneaking around at night. And you yourself said it's bad for the cows to be - "

" - She can plea though, right? No trial. No jury. No publicity."

"Yes. I can see to that. No one has to know but the sheriff's department and the court, but it would be on the books as a first offense, so if she does it again – "

"- I don't think she's going to do it again."

"I don't either," Carol agrees. "But she'd have to pay the fine. She says she stole two to three quarts, so the fine would probably be four to six quarts, depending on what the judge decides. I'll try to see that it's only four."

"I'll pay her fine," he says.

"That's two week's of milk rations for you." They get two quarts per person per week.

"I don't need it. But if you can get the court to take the fine in four-week installments, it would help. A quart a week. Then I still have one to cool my oatmeal in the morning."

Carol nods. "I think I can get that to happen."

"Thank you." He looks back over at the bar. "I'll go tell her the plan."

"You really care about her," Carol says.

"I care about them all," Gunther replies. "Linda. Trisha. Candy. This tavern is my half-home, and these ladies are my family." He scoots back his chair and heads for the bar.

[*]

Daryl turns sleepily in bed when Carol crawls in and kisses his bare shoulder. He's still sleeping naked, though summer is slowly easing into fall, and eventually he'll go to boxers, and then boxers and a t-shirt, and then sweats. It's a sign of his gradual domestication, she thinks, this comfort in not sleeping dressed. He nuzzles her neck and murmurs, "Ya crack the case, detective?"

Carol tells him what happened.

"Hmm…Gunther ain't an asshole."

"High praise coming from you." She snuggles in with her head on his chest. "But I think I have to apologize for dismissing your concerns. I think you might be right. I think maybe he _is_ attracted to me."

Daryl's eyes shoot open again. "What?"

She tells him about the lunch invitation and the way Gunther pushed it just a little when she said no the first time.

"Pfffft," Daryl mutters and closes his eyes again.

"That's it? I expected a bigger reaction." As jealous as he's acted, she feared the lunch invitation would set him off.

"Just glad ya realized it so ya'd draw a clear line. Sounds like ya did. 'N it sounds like Gunther stayed behind it. 'S all good." He hugs her and then sleepily relaxes his arms.

The fall crickets sing outside the open bedroom window as Carol glides into sleep.


	122. Chapter 122

Trisha settles quietly out of court, and by mid-September, Gunther has paid off half of her fine. VanDaryl, despite having been nearly premature, has plumped up to almost seventeen pounds and begun rolling more daringly from front to back and back to front. Sweetheart has taken to pulling up on the coffee table chest and inching her way around it, usually with several falls to her bottom and additional pull-ups before completing a lap. And Daryl has grown restless. He loves his little family, but he's not used to all this continuous domesticity.

"You need to get out for a day," Carol tells him. "Maybe even a night. We'll _all_ be the happier for it. Why don't you go scavenging?"

She doesn't have to tell him twice. He doesn't go alone, though. He invites Raul, because he hasn't spent much time with the kid since the cabin was completed. Besides, Raul did a lot of roaming after Williamsburg fell, and he knows where _not_ to bother looking.

They take the Kingdom's horses Lancelot and Guinevere and the long flat cart so they'll have room to store building supplies for the dormitory. The building project has begun, and the workmen already have about three-quarters of the supplies they'll need to complete it, but Inola has given Raul a list of what she still needs.

"Do we get extra rations for this?" Raul asks as he drives the horses forward. Daryl sits on the bench seat beside him studying a map. "Since we'll be bringing back community supplies?"

"Council says four hours, no matter how long it takes."

"Well that's shit," Raul mutters. "I could have been doing extra work in the fields."

"Wanna go back? Do it m'self."

"No," Raul replies hastily. "I didn't say that. I want to go with you."

"Get to keep ten percent of whatever we find that _ain't_ buildin' supplies."

"Oh. That I like. Where do you want to go?"

Daryl runs a finger over the map he marked after consulting an old Yellow Pages phone book Garland's keeps in the mayor's office. "There's an Ace Hardware – "

"- No," Raul interrupts. "That closed a few months _before_ the Epidemic. It was cleaned out and for lease. I stayed there a few nights once, when I was roaming."

"A'right. Well, there's a Loew's in - "

"- Grove? Nope. Cleaned out. By Jamestown in 3 NE. My dad told me that.

"And the Home Depot's cleared out now," Daryl mutters.

"You know where Jamestown _hasn't_ been since the start?"

"Where?"

"Yorktown. My dad said the Navy cleared out the Naval Weapons Station when they were fighting back the hordes, used a lot of firepower, and probably burned down a good part of the town to the ground. They put up road barriers and barbwire to block off any surviving lurchers from the road to Jamestown and moved base. No one was looting Yorktown at the start, it was so overrun. So whatever _didn't_ catch fire from fighting the hordes…it's probably still there."

"'N the walkers?"

"That was eight years ago. Almost nine now. My guess is that's the herd that eventually overran my camp at Williamsburg. They ran into the roadblocks to Jamestown and turned north instead. I suspect they're mostly gone by now."

Daryl measures the distance on the map. "That's gonna take five or six hours each way. Have to stay the night, rest the horses."

"I don't mind. I don't have to be to work until tomorrow afternoon. As long as we head home at sunrise. Do you mind?"

"Nah. Carol told me I could." She won't be surprised if he isn't back until tomorrow.

"You need her permission?"

"I do if I wanna get laid."

Raul laughs. He cracks the whip, and Lancelot and Guinevere pick up their pace.

[*]

The door to the New Jamestown Museum and Council Chambers is closed. The filing cabinet drawer rolls shut with a clang. Garland drops a manila folder on the table. It's so thick it's held together with a rubber band. "These are the applications for the ship's crew and trade team. Let's get to work."

The council sits on both sides of the table, Carol between Inola and Garland and across from Gunther, who sits between Carolyn and Lieutenant Witherspoon. Dr. Ahmad rounds out the end of the table, across from Deputy Thomas and Barry.

Garland opens the folder. "Let's start with just the crew first. Ten experienced sailors are needed. Barry, would you take notes?"

"Why am _I_ secretary?"

"Because Carolyn's wrist is sprained, and I _asked_ you to be."

"Why not Carol then?" Barry replies. "Or Inola?"

Inola glares at him. "You're such a sexist ass, you know that?"

"I'll be secretary," Dr. Ahmad volunteers and reaches for a legal pad and pencil.

"Not with your doctor's handwriting, you won't," Thomas says. "I'll do it." The deputy slides the pad from the doctor, who shrugs and tosses him the pencil.

Thomas writes the numbers 1-10 on the first ten rows of the page.

Garland flips over the first page in the folder. "Captain Cummins will navigate, so that's number one." Thomas writes _Captain David Cummins_ in slot one. "Commander Lawson has made it clear he won't be serving on the trip, but Lieutenant-Commander McBride has volunteered. We need an experienced second in command, so that's number two."

Thomas scrawls _Lieutenant-Commander Arnold McBride_ in spot two.

"Lieutenant Witherspoon will be third in command and will also serve as a representative of the council for the trip."

The lieutenant smiles as Thomas scrawls _Lieutenant James Witherspoon_ on the third line.

"And this is where the debate begins." Garland flicks through the corners of the pages. "We have eighteen crew applications for the remaining seven crew slots."

"I say we draw lots and be done with it," Barry suggests.

"I say we actually consider their applications," Garland replies.

[*]

The journey is silent for a good mile, and Raul seems gloomy. "'S been eatin' ya, kid?" Daryl asks finally.

Raul sighs. "We did it."

"Who did what?"

"Me and Kelly. We did _it_. Well, not quite it. She doesn't want to risk getting pregnant. But we did pretty damn close to it. As close as I've ever gotten to it anyway. Willingly with a woman, I mean. I don't count…you know." He's talking about being abused by the cult leader that imprisoned him, and Daryl grits his teeth in anger. At least Raul got his revenge and rescued Sweetheart. "My girlfriend in Williamsburg…she never let me much past second base."

Daryl doesn't know what to say. Raul clearly isn't bragging, so a Merle-style _thatta boy_ doesn't seem to be in order. The young man doesn't even seem happy. He sounds upset, but _sorry_ seems like a weird response to a guy telling you he got laid. Or _almost_ laid. So Daryl doesn't say anything.

Eventually, Raul does. "It was good. I liked it. I wasn't sure, after everything I went through with that cult leader…how it would be, you know?" When Daryl says nothing, Raul mumbles, "Sorry, you probably want me to save all this for the psychologist."

"Shrink been helpin'?"

"He helped at first. With some things. But I can't help but feel like I'm paying someone to pretend to be interested in my problems. And I feel like we just keep circling the same shit over and over. I don't how much longer I'll keep going. I think he's done all he can do for me. I've just got to work the rest of it out myself."

"Mhmm."

"It was good," Raul says quietly as the horse hooves clomp over the highway. "With Kelly."

"'S the problem, then?"

"I guess I just thought…you know…since we did _that_ , I thought it meant we were serious. But the next day, she went out with Harry again."

Daryl makes a sympathetic grunt.

"I mean, it was his usual day. I take her out on Friday nights. Harry takes her out on Saturday afternoons. And Wednesday night, she has date night with Nick. I knew all this. I just thought since we…" He shrugs. "I thought us doing that meant it had changed. And that it was just going to be _us_ after that. Exclusively."

"Mhmhm."

"But I guess not."

"Ya tell 'er that's what ya want?"

Raul glances at him and then looks at the road again. "No. Not exactly."

"Ain't no relationship guru, but I think maybe ya gotta tell 'er that ya don't want 'er seein' no one else."

"What if that makes her break up with me, though? I want to keep seeing her."

"Hell would it?" Daryl asks.

Raul shrugs. "Maybe she'll think I'm needy or something. Smothering."

"Ain't _needy_ to not want yer girl screwin' other guys."

"You think she's screwing them?" Raul asks with alarm.

"Uhh…"

"Oh shit. I didn't even think of that. I mean, if she did all that with me, does that mean she's doing all that with them, too?"

Fuck. What does he say now? "Dunno."

Raul sighs. "I don't know why she'd pick me anyway."

"Hell wouldn't she? Harry's a smug little smirk." The sailor smiles knowingly every time Mitch and Lieutenant Witherspoon are within ten feet of each other. Of course, Harry does look after that senile grandmother of his and work for her rations, so he can't be a total ass. "'N Nick's…" Daryl doesn't really know what Nick is. He's a front gate guard who's never crossed Daryl in any way and who reminds him a little bit of Zach from the prison. "Nick's a dumbass."

"He is?" Raul asks.

"Oh, yeah, complete dumbass."

"Kelly says he graduated valedictorian of his high school class and got into Harvard. But then the Epidemic happened, so he never went."

"Hell kind of loser goes to Harvard?"

Raul laughs, but not for long. He grits his teeth. "I wasn't even done with middle school at the time. They're both older than me. Closer to Kelly's age. I wonder which one she'll pick. In the end."

"Ain't gonna pick either of 'em, 'cause yer gonna tell 'er ya want 'er to dump 'em if she wants you."

"I don't think that's going to work. I think I better take what I can get."

"Nah, man, yer worth more 'n that. If she dumps ya, she dumps ya."

"Easy for you to say! You've got a wife."

Daryl swings his crossbow off his back because there's a walker lurching on the shoulder that has just caught wind of the horses. He shoots it when it's on the pavement and then hangs off the cart to pluck out his arrow as Raul drives past. He flicks his red bandana out of his pocket to clean the tip. "What yer dad say?"

"I didn't tell my dad."

"Nah? Y'all don't talk?"

"He's kind of like a stranger. You know, this stranger I live with. He tried to connect with me after he found me again, but it'd been over eight years. I was completely different. I wasn't the kid he left behind in Texas when he went to teach at FLETC. He's changed, too. But he's at least recognizable. I'm not. I'm just not. To him. I'm a roommate."

"Santiago said if ya got busted for stealin', 'n ya ended up not getting' citizenship, 'n they kicked ya out – he was gonna go with ya. He was gonna leave every damn thing he knew here, and go with ya. That ain't somethin' ya do for your roommate. 'S somethin' ya do for your boy."

"He said that?"

"Told Carol."

Raul seems to mull that over for a bit. "We don't really talk," he says. "I mean we talk. We just don't… _talk_. But I guess we never really talked, even before the Epidemic. He was always more of a toss-the-ball dad than a talk-to-you dad. We did stuff together, a lot. But my mom did the talking. I miss her. Still."

"That don't ever stop."

"It hasn't stopped for you?"

"I wasn't close to my mama like you were. But I still think 'bout 'er sometimes."

"You think about your dad?"

"Try not to," Daryl replies. "'Cause those ain't never good thoughts. Got a few good ones of my mama, though."

"Like what?"

"She used to read to me. 'Fore she started drinking so much. When I's real little. She'd do the voices. 'N she was good at 'em, too. Probably could have been a stand-up or somethin'."

"An impressionist."

"Yeah. She had a real good sense of humor. Got snarky with m'dad sometimes, though, 'n it pissed him off. He beat all the good humor out of 'er, 'ventually."

"Your dad beat your mom?" Raul asks.

"Not physically. Took that out on m'brother. 'N after m'brother was gone, he took it out on me. But he beat the spirit out of 'er. Just by being who he was."

"When did you lose your brother?"

Daryl swings his crossbow off his shoulder again, but only because he needs something to fiddle with if he's going to talk about Merle. "After."

"He transformed?"

"Mhmhm. Had to put 'em down m'self."

"Like I had to," Raul says quietly. "With my mom."

"Yeah."

"I always wanted a big brother," Raul says. "Must have been nice."

"Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes…" Daryl huffs. "Not so much. Think 's better to have a little brother. Then ya get to be top dog."

"But you've gotta look out for him, if he's younger."

"Yeah. Guess so. Hey, watch the damn road!"

The back wheel of the cart almost dips into a great pothole, but Raul steers it out just in time.


	123. Chapter 123

Three Navy officers and seven seaman have been chosen for the crew, but the ship still has room for fifteen more people. It might be able to hold even more, but they want room for cargo for trade and rations for the journey, and they don't want to release too many people onto the shores of Oceanside.

Garland shepherds the selection process with a German efficiency that makes Carol wonder how tortuously long the council meetings will be when he's no longer chairman. Carol and Daryl are chosen, followed by Thomas, because the ship will need a medic, and Carolyn, because the council wants its veterinarian to check out any animals that might be accepted in trade. "And Gunther," Garland says, "I want you on there."

"Me? Whatever for? I didn't even apply."

"The charter says we need a minimum of five council representatives to negotiate any treaty. You'll be the fifth, along with Carol, Thomas, Carolyn, and the lieutenant."

"Why me?"

"You don't have a family you'd be leaving for the week, and you know what we need in terms of cuttings and seeds and animals. Also, the Alliance has a book of some kind."

" _A Key to a Future_ ," Carol explains. "The Hilltop always brings it to the trade fair to share information. It has a lot of blueprints and details about old-school farming."

"I want you to look through it and take notes," Garland explains. "You said we need to improve our irrigation system to survive the next drought. Maybe this book can help."

"November is a harvest month. I'm the assistant farm manager."

"Ernesto can manage without you for six to eight days," Garland assures him. "And we assigned a second assistant manager. At _your_ request, I might add."

Barry leans forward and fake whispers, "I don't know if you've heard, but there are apparently a _lot_ of single women on that island."

"I hardly think two days is a sufficient time period to woo a woman," Gunther replies. "But if the mayor wants me there, I'll go."

Thomas scrawls Gunther's name down on the pad. "Eleven slots left."

"Now we start sorting through this huge pile of applications." Garland picks up one. "Bob."

"Bob?" Carol asks. "No. That's just going to set off a fight between him and Mary."

"How are they doing?" Garland asks.

"Well, they haven't ended up in a jail cell again, so that's an improvement."

"We'll make this the no pile." Garland lays Bob's application in the center of the table. No one objects. He turns over another application. "Deputy Andrew?"

Gunther looks suspiciously at the application in Garland's hand. "He _just_ got married a few weeks ago. To Trisha. I don't know why he'd think of leaving."

"I don't think we should send him," Carol agrees.

"No pile?" Garland asks. When he gets three nods and a couple of shrugs and no protests, he tosses it on the no pile and lifts the next application. "Marcus."

"He's our best fisherman, and the only one with real experience crabbing," Carolyn says.

"He can double as a sailor if needed, too," Lieutenant Witherspoon adds. "He knows his way around a boat."

"So that's a yes?" Garland asks, raising his hand. Eight other hands go up. He sets the application down in the YES pile and picks up another. "Mitch?"

"Mitch applied?" Lieutenant Witherspoon asks with obvious surprise.

"You object?" Garland asks.

"No. No…I just. I didn't know he had."

Barry stretches out his legs beneath the table. "I guess he's hoping there'll be some fags in the Alliance since he can't find one here."

Lieutenant Witherspoon looks straight ahead at the wall, clearly willing himself not to react, while Garland says, sharply, "Barry, I won't have that word used at my council table."

"Alliance?" Barry asks.

"You _know_ what word," Carolyn spits. "How can you sit here and say that in front of me?"

"Well, _lesbians_ don't count," Barry insists. "Because woman on woman action is hot."

Carolyn flicks him off. "How does your wife put up with you?"

"She doesn't mind all the extra fowl I put on the table." Barry grins. "Let's just say she likes my meat."

"We'll make this the maybe pile," Garland says loudly enough to show he's irritated. He sets Mitch's application in its own pile. "We'll narrow the maybes down at the end." He turns another page. "Nick O'Connell?"

"Who's Nick?" Carol asks. She's tried to learn everyone's name, but she can't put the name to the face at the moment.

"A front gate guard," Inola tells her. "The young blond with the dimples and blue eyes and that little scar on his chin."

"That's surprisingly detailed," Gunther says. "What would Dante think?"

"Well, I let Nick take me on a date once."

"Just one?" Gunther asks.

Inola shrugs. "He was too young for me."

"I was too old for you, and I at least made it to a second date."

"You _might_ have made it to a third date," Inola says with a smile, "if Dante hadn't finally pulled his head out of his ass."

"Well, fortunately for you I served the purpose of making him jealous before you had to resort to that."

Inola's smile falters. She looks at Gunther as though trying to decide if he's jesting or genuinely wounded.

"I'm joking," he clarifies. "You two are right for each other."

Garland clears his throat. He holds Nick's application over the maybe pile. "Any objections?" When there are none forthcoming, he drops it. He reads the name on the next application. "Daniel. I vote no. I'd rather not send a former felon as one of our emissaries, even if he was welcomed back into the fold." When no one objects, Daniel goes in the NO pile. Garland blinks skeptically at the next application.

"Who is it?" Barry asks.

"Candy," Garland replies.

Barry laughs.

"Absolutely not," Gunther says. "An unknown situation like that isn't safe for her. At least here she can rest assured that if some man gets out of line, the law will stomp down on him."

"I can assure you such abuses wouldn't be tolerated in the Alliance, either," Carol says in instinctive defense of her old friends. "The Hilltop, Alexandria, and Oceanside all have strong, ethical leaders."

"God knows what STDs she might bring back to Jamestown after prostituting herself to an entire trade fair," Dr. Ahmad adds.

Carol tries not to feel defensive at the suggestion that the Alliance is brimming with STDs and men eager to avail themselves of the services of a prostitute. She could make a snide comment about Jamestown's once popular whorehut, but she doesn't. And the truth is, Carol doesn't doubt that Candy would make at least some profitable 'trades' at the fair. "Well obviously this is a no. I think we can all agree on that."

Garland tosses Candy's application into the NO pile. He picks up another sheet. "Huh. Earl."

"He probably just wants to have revenge sex," Carolyn says. "That's all he'll be looking for. Not to make good trades. We should give preference to people with their heads more in the game."

Barry smirks. "You mean their heads less in the game?" He makes a circle with his thumb and forefinger and drives another finger in and out of it.

"Enough with the bad jokes, Barry," Garland mutters. "My larger concern is having Earl and Captain Cummins on a ship in close quarters with each other for several days."

"Oh, yeah. That could go very badly," Barry agrees. "How did the divorce settlement turn out, anyway? I hope Earl got the cabin."

"The court ordered a dividing wall," Thomas tells him. "And a second entrance. Ana got the half with the wood stove, and Earl got the half with the fireplace. So they can both cook and have heat."

"Oh, I would have hated to live that closely to my ex-wife," Carolyn says.

"You had an ex-wife?" Barry asks. "Was she blonde, too?"

"I'd rather not contribute to your masturbatory fantasies with any additional details," Carolyn tells him coolly.

Garland ignores the disruption. "I'm also not fond of the idea of our Sheriff going out of town for a week, and Earl will be off administrative leave come October. So I'm putting his application in the NO pile, unless there are any objections." When none are raised, Garland drops Earl's application and picks up another. "Timothy Meadows."

"Who?" Inola asks.

"Timmy Two Toes," Gunther replies.

"No," Carol insists. "I've had him in the drunk tank twice in the past month."

That application slips easily into the NO pile.

"Huh," Garland says as he picks up the next application. "I wonder if his father knows he's applied."

"Who?" Carol asks.

"Raul."

[*]

The wagon jerks forward over a piece of debris, and Daryl puts a hand down on the bench seat to steady himself.

"Want to hear something weird?" Raul asks.

"What?"

"My girlfriend is only five years younger than my dad's girlfriend. Kelly's 25 and Sarah's 30."

"Mhmhm."

"Not that Kelley's really my girlfriend," he mutters. "I mean, not just mine anyway."

"Yeah, well, make 'er just yers, then."

"How?"

What would Merle have told Daryl? "Take the bull by the horns 'n…" Daryl stops there because Merle probably would have said something like _and fuck her right between the titties_ , and Daryl would point out that a bull's male, and that he's not into bestiality anyway, and Merle would say, _Aww, never mind! You just can't appreciate a good metaphor, dumbass._ "Hell, I dunno. I just got lucky."

"If Kelly and I had a baby girl," Raul says as he steers the cart onto the left side of the highway to avoid an abandoned car several yards ahead, "And Sarah and my dad had a baby boy a month later…my daughter would be older than her uncle. That's just weird."

"Better not be havin' any babies if ya ain't married."

"That's what my dad told me. About a hundred times. He left some sex ed book on my cot. Like I might not know what makes a girl pregnant. _He's_ the one who got a girl pregnant in high school, not me. Of course…" Raul shrugs. "I didn't go to high school." Raul drives past a shot-up road sign that reads _Yorktown…16 miles._ He's quiet for about a block and then says, "I think he'll marry Sarah, eventually. If she says yes. He's forgotten my mother."

"Ain't no way he's forgotten 'er, kid. But 's been goin' on nine years. 'N she's gone."

Raul looks off at the tree line at the other side of the highway before turning to the road again.

"A man gets lonely. Most men, anyhow. I never much did."

"But you got married anyway?" Raul asks.

"Well...'cause it was Carol. Wouldn't of otherwise. Would of been fine alone." And he would have been. Fine. He wouldn't have known he wasn't happy, because he never knew what happiness was until Carol was his.

"If I get on this trade trip," Raul says, "and so does Nick, when we come back, Kelly will probably have settled on Harry. He didn't apply for the crew, because he didn't want to leave his grandmother alone for a week."

"Ya applied?"

"Yeah. Sounded fun. A fair. Is it fun?"

"Guess," Daryl says, "if ya like that kind of shit." He never liked it, not really. Too many people, too much noise, and for the first three years, he had to see Carol with Ezekiel.

"I doubt I'll get picked to go anyway."

[*]

Thirty-nine applications now sit in the maybe pile, including Raul's. The NO pile is almost as large. "And now we just have to whittle this down to ten," Garland says. He flips the maybes over and starts from the top again. "Mitch."

"I don't even know why he would want to go," Lieutenant Witherspoon says.

"Clearly he's looking for a boyfriend," Barry says. "I heard there were a couple of gay men at the Hilltop."

This suggestion seems to fluster the lieutenant. "I…I don't think we should accept his application. We already have a hunter on the ship. Daryl. We need..you know…broader representation."

"I don't think Mitch is looking for a boyfriend in the Alliance," says Carol, watching the lieutenant relax slightly as she speaks. "I'm sure Daryl's told him that Jesus and Aaron are together. But Mitch is an excellent shot. That would probably serve us well if we ran into pirates or other trouble. I say we accept his application."

"Why waste a spot on a gay man when there are" - Barry slaps his hand down on the stack of papers - "all these single men desperate to meet a woman."

"This is a trade trip, Barry," Gunther says. "Not Rumspringa."

"What the hell is Rumspringa?"

"That Amish thing," Thomas explains, "where the teenagers leave the community and go out and sew their wild oats."

"You're Amish?" Barry asks Gunther. "Is _that_ why you know how to farm so well?"

" _No_ , I'm not Amish!"

"But his parents were Mennonites," Inola says.

"Only my father. He married outside the tribe."

"We were discussing _Mitch_." Garland impatiently taps the application. "Other points for or against?"

"Well, he sure is skinny," Barry says. "He won't take up much space on the ship."

"He's not _skinny_ ," Lieutenant Witherspoon replies. "He's just… _lean_."

"I'm in favor," Carol says and raises her hand. Garland raises his, too, and then, uncertainly, the lieutenant raises his. Six more hands go up, and Mitch goes in the YES pile. Four Kingdom people have applied – they want to see old friends – but Carol only manages to get one on the ship, the electrician, Jimmy, because she emphasizes that they'll need him to decide what electrical parts to trade Alexandria for.

The guard Nick ends up with a spot, as does another single, twenty-something man and three unmarried men in their early thirties. Garland may be peeved by chatter of sex and romance, but he's clearly steering the younger singles onto the ship, and Carol doesn't blame him. Jamestown has a gender balance problem, and this might be the first step in forging attractions that will lead to perpetuating the communities into a second generation. So she's not surprised when he suggests Raul take the last slot.

"That's not really fair," Barry says. "Why should a refugee get a slot over people who have been here for years?"

"He's a citizen now," Garland says. "And all citizens have the same rights and considerations, regardless of when they came here."

"Why shouldn't we give it to Marty instead?"

"Marty's sixty," Garland replies. "And we already have two hunters on board."

"As an apothecary, Raul would be good to have when it comes to trading herbs for making medicines," Carol suggests.

"Yeah, I don't know anything about that," Thomas agrees. "I mean, not about making them from scratch. I just treat people in a pinch."

There's another ten minutes of debate, but by the end of it, Raul has secured the final space on the ship.


	124. Chapter 124

After the long council meeting, Carol stops for a late lunch at the tavern and gets caught up in a game of Risk with Gunther and Madam Linda. The place is closing down for the break before dinner, but the game continues at a four-person table. "I'll end my turn here," says Carol as she pushes her armies into Western Europe.

Trisha sets down a cup of coffee next to Gunther. "On the house," she says. "And thank you again."

"You have to stop thanking me at some point." Gunther picks up the cup and blows across the surface.

"You know, caffeine isn't good for his blood pressure either," Madam Linda says. "Bring him decaf tea next time."

Trisha rolls her eyes as she heads back to the bar.

"Gunther, I'm attacking you in Mongolia." Linda picks up three white dice.

Candy puts up a chair at the table next to theirs. "I can't believe y'all didn't put me on that ship. Do you have any idea how much booze I could have come back with? I hear the Hilltop makes wine and Oceanside makes rum."

"It's for your own good," Gunther tells her as he rolls a single red die.

"You aren't my father." Candy sashays to the table on the other side of them and begins wiping it down.

"I guess November will mark the end of our whirlwind romance," says Linda as she takes one of Gunther's armies and puts it in his container. She rolls again with three white dice.

"What's that mean?" Gunther asks.

"Well, you'll find some lovely lady at Oceanside and forget all about our board game competitions."

Gunther rolls a single red die. "I doubt very much any woman at Oceanside is going to take an interest in a beat-up, middle-age farmer from Jamestown."

Linda takes another one of his armies. "You're a handsome man, Gunther, when you bother to brush that wild hair of yours. Nice and tan from the sun, stout and stocky from the work."

"Stocky," Gunther replies with a smile. "Is that the polite way to put it these days?"

"Women like a stocky man. It makes them feel like ladies. I had better enjoy these competitions while I can." Linda moves into Mongolia, ends her turn, and draws a card. "Who knows what woman you might bring back with you."

"Well, even if some unfortunate woman were to take an interest in me," Gunther replies, "Attacking you, Carol, in Ontario. With two." He picks up two white dice. "I assure you that would not mean an end to our friendship or our time together."

"You say that now," Linda tells him, "but you'll want to spend every moment with her."

"Well, then, she can join us for our game afternoons." Gunther rolls.

Carol defends with a single red die.

"But she might be jealous of my stunning good looks," Linda says.

"A jealous spouse is not for me."

"Me either," Candy says as she plops down in the fourth, empty chair at the table. "I don't understand all this exclusivity in marriage nonsense. My husband and I had an open marriage."

"You were married?" Trisha cries skeptically from the bar where she's drying glasses. "Before all this?"

"Of course I was married!" Candy calls back. "Why wouldn't I be!"

"How did that work out?" Gunther asks. "The open marriage?"

"Well, not very well. He left me for one of his girlfriends."

Carol suppresses a laugh. She plucks up one of Gunther's armies and puts it in his container.

"I'll end my turn here," he says, "since I can't seem to defeat Carol."

"I have to leave the game, unfortunately," Carol tells them. "I'm on patrol in fifteen minutes."

As Carol drains her beer, Gunther fishes out a pocket watch. "I still have an hour before we milk the goats. Shall we start over, old friend?"

Linda begins collecting the armies from the board. "Let's play something else."

"What?" Gunther asks.

Candy smirks. "She wants to play the spin the bottle."

"Get back to work," Linda tells her.

[*]

They passed the cleared-out Naval Weapons Station two miles ago, and now the horses clatter to a stop before the cement barrier just outside the American Revolution Museum. The road and both shoulders are completely blocked off with a combination of cement barriers and quadruple layered barbwire fencing that extends into the woods on either side. Enough walkers would have torn down the wire-only portions, but the barbs and blockades might have prompted a herd in pursuit of nothing to turn around.

"I guess we need to move one of those blockades to get through," Raul says.

"Later. Stay with the horses. Water 'em. I'll scout on ahead." Daryl takes only his bow and binoculars and leaves his pack with Raul. He vaults the cement barrier and jogs through the parking lot to the museum.

The first floor of the place is strangely boarded up from the _outside_ , while the windows on the second floor are untouched. White paint peels off the portico of the second-story balcony. Daryl scales the fire escape to the roof, where he finds an abandoned rocket-propelled grenade launcher. The rooftop is scattered with shell casings. It's clear the Navy was at one time firing on the hordes from this perch. He crouches down to examine the launcher and finds it cracked all the way from the trigger to the breech. Some of the brass they could probably use for reloading, however, so he finds the best pieces and fills two pockets of his cargo pants. The Navy wasn't thinking of running out of ammunition back then.

Standing on the roof of the museum, with his back to the barricades, Daryl surveys Yorktown through binoculars. There are hundreds of dead walker bodies scattered in the streets – some stabbed, some shot, some burned. The blackened, unyielding skeletons of otherwise burnt-up trees rise up from the overgrown grass between buildings. Cannon ball holes leave gaping spaces in soot-caked walls, and the streets are lined with burnt-down structures.

A few buildings still stand, however, untouched by the fires set – intentionally or unintentionally - by the Navy. In the far distance, two large, burned-out ships float beside the dock of the shipyard, but most of the vessels, it seems, were cut loose or deliberately sailed into the ocean. Some of the Navy, Raul heard, sailed north to Canada in search of untouched lands, while only the brave few stayed to fight back the hordes.

Daryl sees no signs of a herd – not even the occasional walker bumbling about. Raul probably guessed correctly. What walkers remained after the town was blanketed with gunfire and grenades likely collected together and eventually moved on – toward Williamsburg, where they overran Raul's camp.

Daryl can't make out what any of the surviving buildings are. They're either too far away, or the signs face the other direction, or they're covered in soot. But there's enough still standing that they might score some loot in this town. "Hell yeah," he murmurs to himself as he lowers the binoculars.

When Daryl returns, the horses are lapping up water from a pan and Raul is munching on jerky. He hands Daryl a piece. They have a late lunch – or an early dinner – and Daryl empties the brass he collected into an empty crate on the cart. After eating, they try to move one of the cement barriers. They each throw their entire weights into opposite sides, but it doesn't budge. They work shoulder to shoulder together on one end, and the barrier moves slightly, grinding a couple of inches across the pavement before they give up in exhaustion. "Shit," Daryl mutters. "These things're heavier than they look."

"We could use the horses, too?" Raul suggests. "We could push as they pull. I brought towing wire and there's a hitch on the cart."

Daryl claps a hand down on his shoulder. "Yer a regular Boy Scout, little brother." It's something Merle would have said, in a rare good mood, and it just comes out.

Raul grins.

[*]

When Carol stops by the jailhouse to get the patrol notebook, Sarah is sitting up on the wooden table with Santiago standing between her legs and rutting against her slightly as they suck face like two teenagers in the backseat of a muscle car. Carol clears her throat, and Santiago flies back and slams into the closed iron bars of a cell. Sarah laughs and slides off the table.

"We eat on that table sometimes," Carol reminds them.

Santiago puts a hand casually on one of the bars. "Sarah just got off patrol."

"I know. I'm here to relieve her."

Sarah fishes the tiny notebook out of her front pocket and hands it over. "No complaints today, at least not on my shift. Did you get the trade team selected?"

"Yes. Twenty-five, including the sailors. The official list is posted outside the council chambers." Carol turns to Santiago. "Did you know Raul was applying?"

"Tell me you didn't pick him."

"He's on the manifest."

Santiago sighs and tips up his brown felt cowboy hat.

"Why does that bother you?" Sarah asks. "It means you get the cabin to yourself for a week."

He smiles. "Yeah? Are you planning to stay with me all week?"

"Possibly," Sarah replies, "if you play your cards right between now and then."

"I'm just worried he won't come back," Santiago admits. "He'll find some girl there, and the _Susan Constant_ will return with nothing but a goodbye letter for me. I _just_ found him a few months ago."

"Doesn't he have a girlfriend here?" Sarah asks. "I thought he was seeing Kelly."

As they talk, Carol flips through the notebook to see all the notes taken since she was last on patrol.

"He is, but she doesn't seem too serious about him," Santiago replies. "She's not manipulating him like Barry's girl was. She _likes_ him, and she's been honest about who else she's seeing. But I'm not sure she's as into him as he's into her."

"Kelly's not used to all the attention," Sarah says. "I wasn't either, to tell you the truth. It makes it hard to make a decision. And apparently I made the wrong one at first." She shakes her head. "I'm so sorry for Earl. Do you think I should have said something sooner? I just didn't want to tear apart a marriage, not with a baby involved."

" _You_ wouldn't have been the one tearing it apart," Carol assures her as she closes the notebook and tucks it in her pocket.

"I thought David was taking it slowly with me, sexually, because he was a gentleman," Sarah says. "But I think the truth is that Ana getting pregnant gave him a scare."

"Do you think the baby's his?" Santiago asks.

"Who knows. I'll see you tonight? For dinner?"

"Bring an overnight bag," Santiago tells her. "Raul's out scavenging. He won't be coming back until tomorrow."

"Well that's presumptuous of you."

Santiago's smile fades. "Sorry, I just thought - "

Sarah chuckles. "I'll stay if I like the dinner." She slips from the jailhouse.

Carol sharpens her pencil with the manual sharpener mounted to the brick wall and tucks it in her pocket. "So things have been slow?"

"And thank God," says Santiago, letting go of the cell bar. "I don't envy Earl his job. I'll be glad to step back down when he's restored." He rests a hand on his silver belt buckle. "Hey, do you have any really good recipes?"

Carol smiles. "I suspect she's staying the night even if dinner's hotdogs and beans."

[*]

They check out the museum first. Because the first story is boarded up from the outside, they climb up the fire escape and bust in through the second-story balcony. It looks like the Navy used the place as a war hospital while shooting and burning up the walker hordes in Yorktown. The floor is sticky with the now dried, once liquefied tissue that must have seeped out from beneath the sheets that tactfully cover decayed bodies – men who were bitten trying to clear the hordes and eventually mercifully shot before they could turn.

"Why do you think they boarded up the downstairs?" Raul asks. "The lurchers never made it this far before they withdrew to Jamestown. There were no bodies in the parking lot."

"Respect for the dead." Daryl says as he steps over a body and weaves between two more. "No time to bury this many. But they didn't want the walkers comin' in 'n feasting on 'em after they were gone. This place. 'S one giant tomb."

One of the sheets moves slightly, and Daryl, startled, shoots toward the outline of the head, only to discover it's a rat making the movement. He steps back as the creature scurries out from beneath the sheet and runs off.

"God it stinks in here," Raul says. He pulls his shirt up over his nose and wretches, but doesn't vomit.

Daryl rips his arrow out. "C'mon. 'S hurry up."

They pace through the museum, upstairs and then downstairs. "Think these rifles and muskets still work?" asks Raul, peering over his pulled-up collar at one of the display cases.

"Maybe, but we got better guns." Daryl strolls on to another display case, this one about Native Americans who fought with the American revolutionaries. "Could use them arrows though." Daryl bangs the display case with the butt end of his crossbow until it shatters and removes the quiver full of arrows, which he flings onto his shoulder. "Want one of these knives?"

Raul joins him and surveys the weapons. "Not really. I'd just have to clean and sharpen them. But I like the headdress." He picks up the feathered headdress and pops it on his head. "How do I look?"

"Like a doofus."

Raul frowns, takes off the headdress, and tosses it. "I guess you won't bust into that display to get me that tricorn hat, then."

Daryl shrugs. "That might actually look good on ya."

They walk out ten minutes later, Raul with a black tricorn hat perched on his head, and Daryl with a thick, navy blue colonial cape.

"What do you need that cloak for anyway?" Raul asks.

"Winter. Lost my poncho."

They gratefully breathe the fresher air outside. Daryl whisks his new cape off his shoulders, and throws it, along with the Cherokee quiver and arrows, on the back of the cart.


	125. Chapter 125

The horses step over slain walker bodies while the wheels of the cart thud up and down over them. It would be too bumpy a ride, so Raul and Daryl walk alongside the animals, each holding one horse by the reins.

"You looked pretty bad ass in that cloak," Raul says. "Want to try the hat?" He lifts the tricorner hat from his head.

"Nah."

Raul settles it on his head again. "You never wear a hat. Like… _ever_."

It's a factual observation that does not seem to require a reply, so Daryl doesn't make one.

"Mayor Garland has that white Stetson," Raul continues. "My dad has his brown cattleman. Mitch wears that Sherlock Holmes cap."

"'S called a deerstalker," Daryl says.

"Whatever. Gunther and the other farmers have those straw sun hats. Most of the fishermen wear caps. Nick wears that stupid French beret. Harry and all the other sailors have those white navy hats. The captain has his dress cap. But you…never. Not once."

"Ya goin' somewhere with this?"

"Why? Why don't you ever wear a hat?"

"'Cause I don't like 'em."

"Doesn't the sun get in your eyes?"

"Just squint."

"What about in winter?" Raul asks. "You at least wear a hat in winter, right?"

"Nah."

"Never?" Raul asks skeptically. "No matter how cold it gets?"

"Told ya, Don't like 'em."

"Well I like this one." Raul reaches up and adjusts it. "I look like George Washington. I mean, I would, if George Washington was Hispanic. And he didn't have such a big nose. Think Kelly will like it?"

"Hell if I know what girls like."

"Carol never tells you if she likes something you're wearing?"

"Pffft. She tells me if she _don't_ like somethin' 'm wearin'. Like m'boots. In the house."

The road begins to clear up, the walker bodies growing fewer and farther between as they turn a corner. Daryl spies something he didn't see from his perch – a gas station, still standing.

When they pull into it, with the horses and the cart, Daryl sees that the handles of the pumps are lying on the ground. Small puddles of long-dried gas stain the gray pavement. "Bet the Navy cleared out all these pumps." Not that they could use the gas now anyway. It all spoiled years ago.

"But I guess they had to run off to fight the hordes after they did. It doesn't seem they had time to clear out the convenience store." Raul lifts his tircorner hat and uses it to point to the unbroken glass of the store windows.

"'S check 'er out."

[*]

Carol pauses in her rounds to say hello to Earl, who is screwing in a hinge on the new, second entrance to his and Ana's cabin. "Hey." He lowers his screwdriver and moves the door back and forth to test it. "I had to replace a hinge. The other one was too stiff."

Carol can see the particle board divider running down the center of the cabin and turning it into a townhouse of sorts. Ana must have gotten most of the furniture, because there's nothing on Earl's side but a small card table with two folding chairs, a metal footlocker, a tall dresser, and a beat-up armchair someone probably gave him when the divorce was finalized. Books are stacked against one wall. There's no bed – just a sleeping bag and pillow stretched out on a rug before the empty fireplace. And nothing hangs on the walls.

The door clicks shut. "At least I didn't lose the _whole_ thing," Earl says. "I guess I'd rather have the fireplace than the wood stove. Campfire cooking. Like the old days."

"Sorry you didn't get the old library room." Carol talked the council into turning the library into a permanent bedroom. The library books and bookcases have been moved to the theater and now line the side walls. But the council decided to give the old library room to the recently married teenage couple who is expecting a baby, and Carol couldn't really object. She's the one who told them to find another place to have sex than the barn, after all.

"I'd rather live closer to friends anyway," Earl tells her. "I don't really know anyone who lives in the museum. And I guess Ana's going to need help with the baby when it comes. It'll be easier if I'm next door." He sighs and leans back against the closed door. "I don't see Captain Cummins stepping up."

"They've stopped seeing each other?" Carol asks.

"I don't know. She says she stopped seeing him, but I think it's more likely _he_ stopped seeing _her_. Probably back when she first started showing." He uses the tip of his screwdriver to clean under a nail. "All I know is she doesn't bring him around here. I couldn't stand to share the cabin if she did. The divider's not _that_ thick. I know. I could hear her crying last night."

"Maybe she's sorry she ruined your marriage," Carol says.

"So she says." Earl slides the screwdriver into a tool pouch on his belt. "But I think she's just sorry she got caught."

Carol doesn't know what comfort to offer, so she offers an invitation instead: "You should join me and Daryl for dinner next week." Daryl's gotten used to Carol inviting people over, but she's promised him no more than two dinner invitations a week, and the rule is he doesn't have to talk if he doesn't feel like it – she'll carry the entire conversation.

"Thanks," Earl tells her. "I could use a homecooked meal. It's been awhile. I mean…I _cook_ my own meals, obviously, they just aren't very good."

Carol smiles. "I'll talk to Daryl and get back to you on a day."

As she starts to continue her patrol, he calls, "Hey, did you hear if I got a spot on the trade trip?"

Carol, shaking her head, turns back. "No. Sorry."

"Any idea why?"

"You and Captain Cummins, on a ship, Earl? Really? For a week?"

"I wouldn't throw him overboard. I mean, I'd be _tempted_ , sure…"

"You're needed here," Carol says gently. "You'll be back on duty as sheriff again soon. And you need to take some time to yourself to heal instead of immediately chasing another woman, which I think we both know is what you had in mind."

"They say the best way to get over an old love is to get under a new one."

Carol smiles sympathetically. "I think it's time that heals, Earl. Only time."

[*]

Daryl and Raul move about the convenience store in search of anything salvageable. "Hey, Boy Scout," Daryl calls. "Didn't happen to bring a battery tester, did ya?"

"As a matter of fact…" Raul pulls a small battery tester out of one of the deep pockets of his dark green cargo pants. "My dad gave me one for the trip. He picked it up a few years ago when he was scavenging with Garland's posse. You attach these things to the nodes." He points to the small metal clamps dangling from the wires. "And this little white light lights up if it works."

Daryl knows damn well how a battery tester works, but he lets Raul explain it without comment and begins ripping open packages. Alkaline batteries can last up to ten years if stored properly, but most of what they find doesn't work because of years of summers and winters. In another year, they won't even bother. But today, they take the time. They rip open all the battery packages and find about three dozen assorted batteries that still, miraculously, work.

They dump over a couple of boxes of rock-hard packages of chewing gum and shovel the batteries inside. "I can use my dad's portable DVD player now!" Raul exclaims. "He says he hasn't used it in two years, but it still worked the last time he did. I could have a movie night in the cabin with Kelly next Friday. My dad's been cool about that. He volunteered for night patrol the last two Fridays so I can have time alone with her, you know."

They leave the batteries for now and walk around the shelf. "Hell yeah!" He grabs a box of Twinkies, rips it open, and takes out an individually wrapped one.

"You can't eat that after so many years!"

"These things outlast cockroaches." Daryl rips the plastic off, tears the twinkie apart, hands Raul half, and hums as he devours the other half.

"It's really okay?" Raul asks skeptically.

"Stale. Ain't spoiled, though."

Raul cautiously sniffs his half of the Twinkie. "Well, it's not green and it doesn't smell." He takes a timid bite. "Brittle. You can still _kind of_ taste it though." He finishes it off and licks his fingers.

"Used to have Twinkie eatin' contests with m'brother," Daryl says. "Ya know, who can eat the most in so many minutes."

"Did you win?"

"Hell no. He always won 'cause he was always high."

Raul dumps the box of individually wrapped twinkies out on the shelf. "Should we?"

"Need a timer."

"Saw one at the checkout."

Raul shows him the one-minute hourglass beside the cash register. Daryl unwraps all eleven of the remaining Twinkies and lays them out on the counter. "Ready?"

Raul nods and lifts the hourglass.

"Set?"

When Daryl shouts "Go!" Raul flips the timer and slams it down.

Daryl devours the first twinkie in two big bites and grabs another. Raul rips his in half and quickly eats one half and then the other, by which time Daryl has crunched his next twinkie into a ball in the palm of his hand and shoved it down all at once. Raul, witnessing the short cut, does the same.

When the timer runs out, Daryl has polished off five to Raul's four, and only two lonely twinkies remain on the counter. "Damn," the young man mutters, a hand on his stomach, "I thought I'd do better because I'm younger. Doesn't your stomach shrink when you get old or something?"

"Old?" Daryl asks.

"Old _er_."

"Pffft. Ain't 'bout the stomach anyhow. 'S 'bout the mind." He taps his forehead. "Mind over matter."

They clear out the remaining three boxes of Twinkies. Next they load up two small shelves of wine – three dozen bottles - using carboard boxes they empty of other, useless items. There's no way to tell if each individual bottle has turned until they open it, but even cheap wine has a halfway decent change of being at least drinkable, so they take it all.

"Too bad Virginia didn't let ya buy liquor at the gas station," mutters Daryl as he closes up one of the boxes.

"At least we're not in Maryland. They didn't even let you buy wine."

"No shit?"

"Yeah. Wine and beer at state stores only."

"Fuck that."

They carry out two boxes of wine. "Is our finder's fee ten percent _each_ , or ten percent _total_?" Raul asks as he hefts a box onto the cart.

Daryl throws up the other box. "Ten total."

Raul looks at the boxes. "So how many bottles do we each get?"

"Do the math," Daryl mutters.

"Shit, I never made it past 7th grade math."

"That ain't even 7th grade math," Daryl tells him. "Thirty-six bottles. What's ten percent of that?"

"Uh…" Raul looks up. "Ten percent is like one in ten, so…"

"Just move the damn decimal one place. 3.6."

"Well, I don't remember decimals that well!"

"How the fuck are ya mixin' medicines if ya don't know decimals?"

Raul shrugs. "I just kind of learned by watching and doing. I mean, I measure stuff. I weigh it. And then I…well, I guess I _do_ use decimals. But you put me on the spot! I can't do math on the spot!"

"Two bottles." Daryl holds up two fingers. "We each get two bottles."

"Well, that would mean we had four bottles to split," Raul reasons, "not 3.6."

"Ya fuckin' round up, dumbass."

"Geez. Sorry." Raul shifts on his feet. He looks like he's been slapped. "What do you have to call me a dumbass for?"

"Don't mean it!"

"Then why'd you say it?" the young man asks.

"Dunno. 'S just…m'brother always called me that."

"Well your brother sounds like an asshole. I hope you don't call Sweetheart a dumbass when she messes up."

 _Shit_ , Daryl thinks. He probably will. It'll probably slip out one day, and then Sweetheart will cry, and he'll melt into a guilty puddle on the floor of the cabin. Damnit, he's going to be a shit father. Why did Carol think he could do this? "Ain't yer father ever called ya a dumbass?" he asks defensively.

"No."

"Well I ain't yer father." Daryl clomps across the parking lot and back into the convenience store.


	126. Chapter 126

Daryl has finished packing up the diapers – there aren't many, because the baby section is only half a shelf – when Raul joins him. "Need ya to get the women's stuff," he says and extends Raul a cardboard box.

Raul doesn't take the box. "I'm not a girl. I don't know what's what."

"If it says _tampons_ , take it." Women don't actually use tampons anymore – they're too likely to have bacteria at this point – but they make good improvised wicks for candles and great tinder for fire. The hunters can use the thick cords to make small deadfall traps, and the plastic applicators work well as waterproof carrying cases for matches. "If it says _maxipads_ and it don't have mold on the outside of the package, grab 'em. Don't bother with the _douche_."

"Why don't we bother with douche?"

Daryl smirks. "'Cause pussy tastes better natural." He wants Raul to laugh, but the kid doesn't.

Instead, Raul grabs the empty cardboard box roughly. "Oh yeah, of course. I should have known that, but I'm a dumbass." He disappears around the other side.

Daryl sighs heavily. He makes his way over to Raul's side of the shelf and drapes an arm on top. "Listen, 'm sorry I called ya a dumbass. Didn't mean it. Ya ain't a dumbass. Yer a smart kid. But ya can't be so damn sensitive."

"You think I'm sensitive?" Raul huffs. "Do you have any idea what I've been through? Trust me, if I was sensitive, I would have eaten my gun long ago. I only care that you said it because I respect your opinion. Because I respect _you_."

Now Daryl's the one to shift uneasily on his feet. He drops his arm. "I wasn't raised right. I ain't nobody ya should be lookin' up to."

"Yeah. You are. You tracked me all the way from that church. And then you took that baby as your own when she didn't have anyone. You stopped a mutiny in Jamestown. Just _you_ against all those men. I saw the museum display. And then you and Carol got all your people to safety when the Kingdom fell, found them homes at Jamestown and in the Alliance. Not one person lost. You can hunt, you can fight, you can lead, you can track. You can skin, you can gut, you can tan a hide, and you can build a cabin from scratch. So, yeah, your opinion matters to me."

Daryl takes that all in, slowly, in a moment of silence. Feeling a jumble of pride and shame, he asks. "Wanna hear my opinion then?"

Raul throws up a hand as if he's expecting an insult. "Fine. Go ahead."

"I wish I'd been even half the man you are when I was twenty. And that ain't no bullshit."

Raul opens his mouth in surprise and then closes it. He ducks his head and leaves it down for a moment, as if humbled by the sincere compliment. Then he looks up again and says, "I'm actually twenty-one now."

"Whatever. Get the fuckin' tampons."

Raul smiles and begins shoveling the feminine products into the box. "You're right, I was being too sensitive."

"Nah," Daryl replies. "I was bein' an ass. I try not to be anymore, but sometimes it just slips out. Like burpin' up old food." Speaking of old food, his stomach is feeling off. "I'll try to be better. But I can't promise ya nothin'. Just keep callin' me on it. A'right?"

"Sure you want me to?" Raul asks.

"Yeah. Then maybe when Sweetheart's old 'nuff to talk back, I won't be such an asshole." His stomach churns uncomfortably. He pats Raul on the shoulder and tells him he's going to check out the small garage on the other side of the pumps to see if there's anything worth taking.

Daryl struts coolly outside, where he privately vomits up the Twinkies in the bed of an abandoned pick-up truck, wipes his mouth with his bandanna, and then heads to the garage.

Raul joins him a few minutes later. By then Daryl has dumped out a large metal toolbox and is reloading it with just the items on Inola's list. There's no sense wasting space on the cart.

Raul reaches out and with one finger writes his name in the thick dust on the blue Camaro that sits on a slightly raised lift. "I wish I'd gotten to drive a car at least once in my life."

Daryl looks up from the list. "Ya haven't?"

"I wasn't even thirteen when it started. I mean, I guess I could have. No laws or anything, but someone else in my group was always driving back then. And then by the time I was alone, the gas had spoiled. I never learned."

"Teach ya to ride a bike."

"I can ride a bike," Raul assures him. "You've seen me."

Jamestown looted a lot of bicycles just before the gas spoiled, and the camp has a bike stand at the museum and one on the path outside of the Indian Village, with a slew of "community bikes," so anyone can borrow one at any time to get around the camp more quickly. Daryl doesn't ever touch them because he never learned to ride a bicycle. His parents never bought him one. He was always trying to keep up with the neighborhood kids on foot. He figures it can't be that hard, but he doesn't want to make a fool of himself trying. Carol's suggested they grab a couple of bikes on occasion, when they've been headed around the camp, but Daryl always just says, "Rather walk. Like walkin' with ya." And then she thinks he's being romantic, and he scores points. "Nah. I mean a _bike_. Motorcycle. Old friend has mine. Runs on ethanol. When I go to Oceanside, gonna take it back to Jamestown. Teach ya to ride."

Raul grins. "Awesome!"

"Mean, can't do it often. Fuel's hard to make. 'N 'm gonna have to buy the corn to make it. But I'll get enough to teach ya to ride."

Daryl hands Raul the list, and they begin collecting. They mark off a handful of items and then leave the gas station in hopeful search of a hardware store, the cart already one-third full. As they pull out, Daryl in the driver's seat this time, Raul puts one hand down on the side rail, leans over, and leaves a trail of vomit in their wake. "Oh God," he says when he's sitting forward again. "Think it was the twinkies?"

"Maybe. Don't worry 'bout it none. Ya throw it up, that means ya worked out anything rotten."

"Yeah?" Raul asks. "Where'd you get your medical degree?"

"At the School of Hard Knocks. Graduated first in m'class."

Raul chuckles. "But what about you? Don't you need to work it out?"

"Me?" Daryl asks, letting go of one of the reins to pat his abdomen. "I got a stomach made of steel."

[*]

Dog whimpers outside the cabin door when Carol returns from picking Sweetheart up from Shannon's. "Daddy will be home tomorrow," she assures the canine as she opens the door. They don't bother to tie him up outside when they're gone during the day. He wanders where he wishes – killing mice or rats in the barn – and getting love and treats from the children. After one attempt and a severe scolding, he no longer tries to kill the chickens, and yesterday Gunther stopped by to talk to Daryl. He said he thought Dog would make a good part-time herding dog, if only Daryl would let him train the canine a few hours a week. Jamestown has two herding dogs, but between the sheep, the cows, and the goats, they sure could use a third.

Daryl said that Dog was a hunting dog, not a herding dog, and besides, Dog shouldn't have to work more than his twenty. Gunther offered to sweeten the pot with some of his privately grown tobacco, and Daryl said he'd _think_ about it. When Gunther left, Daryl muttered, "Man's jealous of me for m'wife _and_ m'dog," But Carol suspects he'll say yes when he gets back from scavenging, because sharing your dog is not quite the same as sharing your wife, and that tobacco could buy a lot of milk for Sweetheart when she's weaned from Shannon's breast.

Carol sets Sweetheart down in her crib for the moment while she takes off her badge and gun and knives and locks them all in the footlocker. Sweetheart pulls up on the rail and bounces in place and babbles while Dog settles himself on the bear skin rug.

That's when there's a knock at the door. It's Gunther, and Gunther damn well knows Daryl's not at home. Carol only opens the door part way, to let him know he's not being invited inside. He holds a hunk of meat wrapped in brown butcher's paper. "I want you and Daryl to have my share of the horse meat," he says. "As tasty as a good horse steak is, I can't eat General. I know he had to be put down after how badly that leg was broken, but he's worked for me far too long."

"Why not offer it to Linda? I'm sure she'd like it."

Gunther withdraws the wrapped meat. "I know you have a baby and that you've both been working hard lately to store up rations for when she's eating more. I thought you could use the extra energy. But if you don't want it, I'll bring it to the tavern."

"I'm sure it would be appreciated there."

He tips his hat and half turns as though he's going to leave, but then he turns back. "Listen, do you really think the Hilltop will accept a ram and a cock in exchange for a horse?"

"Like I told you, last I heard, their cock had died. Unless they found another one since we left the Kingdom, they need one if they're going to breed chicks. And last I heard, they had three sheep and no ram."

"Well, we've got one of each to spare, given the number that were born this past spring. I just don't want to haul them all the way there to be turned down."

"I bet you can work out a fair trade, if not with the Hilltop, then with Alexandria or Oceanside. If not for a workhorse, then for something else valuable."

Sweetheart squeals loudly from her crib, and Dog barks.

"Sorry. Sounds like I'm interrupting your evening." Gunther takes a step backward away from the door, waves his goodbye, and turns on his heels and leaves.

As she closes the door, Carol thinks about why he might have come by. It's quite possible he wanted to test the waters again while Daryl is away. But another possibility begins to enter her mind – maybe he's just desperately lonely, and he genuinely prefers the company of women to men. Maybe he sees her the same way he does Linda or Trisha or Candy – feminine company that gives him a sense of comfort and belonging, but which he does not expect to lead to romance. She suspects he'll end up at the tavern once again tonight, where he'll trade that horse steak for a bowl of stew, a bargain very much in favor of the house. And then maybe he'll linger after closing for a game or two of chess with Linda, while Candy and Trisha chatter as they clean up the place, before wending his way back to the barracks and all its rowdy male inhabitants.

[*]

Daryl and Raul never do find a hardware store, but they get several of the remaining items on Inola's list from a metal construction trailer nearby an otherwise burnt up building site. The metal largely withstood the fire, though it was warped and partially melted.

They find a fully intact Episcopal church. "It's like a miracle this place wasn't touched," Raul says.

"Yeah? Why didn't God save the hardware store 'n the grocery store? Ain't gonna be shit worth takin' in here."

They do, however, find two bottles of unopened wine in the sacristy. "Ten percent of thirty-eight is 3.8," Raul says, "which still rounds up to four, so we _still_ only get two bottles each for our finder's fee."

"'S why we drink one tonight. What don't come back, don't come back." Daryl slides through the clerical clothes hanging from a rack. They look like they just came back from the dry cleaner before the world went to shit, because they're covered in plastic. He takes off a white robe, a black robe, four different stoles, two ceremonial cloaks, and a black clergy shirt.

"What the hell do you want all that for?" Raul asks.

"Gotta priest in the Alliance might trade me somethin' for it when I go to the fair. He likes all the different costumes."

"I don't think they call them costumes."

"Whatever. Grab me that box."

Later, along the touristy riverwalk, they find an intact used bookstore with blackened brick walls but a roof that never caught fire. "Shit," Daryl mutters, " _This_ is what survives?"

"Kelly did ask me to try to find her a few books," says Raul excitedly as he pulls a crumpled piece of paper out of his front shirt pocket. Daryl finds a brick on the street and bangs it against the glass for a long time before it cracks. Then they take turns throwing the brick until the glass finally shatters.

"Reminds me of the pinatas my mom used to make me for every birthday," Raul says.

Once inside, Raul does manage to find three of the ten books on Kelley's list, and he picks up a couple for himself. Daryl goes to the parenting section first and snags _What to Expect the Toddler Years_ and _What to Expect the Preschool Years_. Then he goes to the kid's section and picks one book each for VanDaryl, Gary, and Sweetheart. He gets another for Judith and one for Hershel, because he hopes to see them both at the fair.

"There's a cafe!" Raul yells excitedly from the back of the store. "Well...Sort of."

The "cafe" turns out to be a single counter lined with Styrofoam cups and napkins, stirrers, a hot water dispenser, tea bags, a half empty jar of instant coffee crystals, a canister of sugar, and a canister of powder creamer. There are two, two-person tables, one in each corner. But when Daryl looks inside the cabinets beneath the counter, he finds it well stocked. There are ten unopened boxes of tea, twenty jars of coffee crystals, twenty canisters of sugar, and ten of powder creamer. "Best damn cafe ever!" he exclaims. "This shit don't spoil. 'Cept the creamer."

[*]

Sweetheart has fallen asleep upright against Carol's shoulder. She stops rocking, stands ever so carefully, and lowers the baby into the crib. Almost immediately, Sweetheart rolls from her back to her stomach and sticks her little bottom up in the air. Carol's heart skips a beat. Sophia used to do that. She kisses her fingertips and then presses them gently to the back of the baby's head. Then she quietly pulls up the rail until it clicks in place.

After pulling the drapes around the baby's room, she lights two oil lamps in the living room – one on the chest and one on the little end stand by the couch. It's still a little too warm for a fire, but she needs light to read as the sun finishes setting. She makes herself a cup of hot tea and then settles in on the couch, glad to have an evening utterly to herself.

Daryl needed to get out and roam a little, work out some of that wanderlust, but that wasn't the only reason Carol urged him to go scavenging. She's been craving a little time to herself, too, without him tracking mud in the cabin, or fiddling with his bow in the arm chair while cursing when the tension isn't just right, or asking if she could get him a drink while she's up (sometimes even when she's sitting down), or pestering her for sex when she's not in the mood. They've both been getting on each other's nerves lately, and a little time apart is just what the doctor ordered. They'll both probably be happily horny when he comes home.

Carol curls her feet up onto the couch and opens a book she checked out from the library after the council meeting – _Denim Dreams_ # 15 – a romance series she hasn't read since her little house outside the Kingdom. She never found #13 or #14, but she thinks she can probably pick up the thread of the plot, such as it is. Carol holds the book with one hand and her tea with the other. She blows across the hot surface of the liquid and prepares to shut off her brain – and shut out the world – for the next two hours.


	127. Chapter 127

Daryl passes the bottle of red wine to Raul, who's sitting cross-legged on his sleeping bag on the top floor of a parking garage, beneath the open sky. They rolled down the gates on the first floor so no walkers will get in, not that they've seen any live ones. Daryl, who's sitting on his own sleeping bag, leans back against two abandoned tires he rolled over and stacked.

Raul takes a sip and lowers the bottle. "Have you ever done drugs? You know…like pot. Or crack cocaine."

"'S two very different drugs."

"Well what drugs _have_ you done?" Raul asks.

"Sniffed paint once. Tried pot a couple times. 'S it." Daryl gestures for the bottle.

"I've never done drugs," Raul says as he leans forward and hands the bottle over. "Always kind of wanted to try."

"Don't. Stay in school." Daryl takes a swig while Raul laughs.

"Seriously, though what's it like? Pot?"

"Didn't like it," Daryl answer. "'S why I only did it twice."

"How can you _not_ like it?" Raul asks. "Doesn't it make you feel good?"

"Just felt weird. 'Sides, saw drugs screw up m'brother, so maybe that kept me from likin' it."

"He was a pothead?" Raul asks.

"Nah. M'brother was addicted to meth. M'daddy was a hardcore drunk. 'N m'mama was a wino and chainsmoker."

"So you never smoked cigarettes either?" Raul asks.

"Pfft." Daryl hands back the bottle. "Smoked like a chimney 'til the smokes started crumblin'. But once I quit, didn't pick it up again. 'N don't ya start!" Daryl warns. "Tobacco's like money in Jamestown."

"Oh, I know. Trust me. I know what all the best currency is and what the trade rate is in any given week. But the value of tobacco is already going down, and pretty soon, it's going to plummet. Too many people are quitting smoking and too many are growing tobacco in their private gardens. If I get on that trade trip, I'm taking all the tobacco I've hoarded. I bet it will be worth a lot more in trade with the Alliance."

"Maybe," Daryl mutters. He knows some people at Hilltop who smoke, and they grow much less tobacco there, and it's not nearly as good as what Jamestown grows, or so he assumes from the smell of it.

Raul sips the wine and then continues, "Coffee beans are really valuable. Those can only grow in a greenhouse, and even that's hard. So no one can inflate the value by growing them in a private garden. And the value's only going to go up when we run out of the instant stuff. We just found twenty jars. And we've got four hundred pounds in storage. But there's about two hundred people who like to drink it in Jamestown. I'd hold onto your jar if I were you. It's going to be like gold in six months."

"Yeah?" Daryl asks as he takes the bottle from Raul's outstretched hand. "Thanks for the stock tip."

Raul smiles. He nods to the cart, which has been unhitched from the horses, who have been unbridled, watered, and fed and are now tethered gently to a post to keep them from wandering. "Which two bottles of wine do you think I should take? Which would impress Kelly the most?"

"Hell if I know."

"I'm thinking one of the pink ones. Girls like pink. Right?"

"They called it row-say."

"Row say?" Raul asks.

"Yeah. Like it's some fancy shit."

"People used to be such dumbasses," Raul mutters as he takes the bottle from Daryl. He sips, hands it back, and asks, "Do you think Kelly's having sex with Harry or Nick? Or both?"

"Don't think 'bout it."

"How can I _not_?"

"Just don't. Trust me. Drive ya mad." Daryl swigs and passes the bottle.

"How would you know?" Raul raises the bottle to his lips.

"Carol used to be married to this other man."

The neck of the bottle slurps from Raul's mouth. "You dated Carol while she was _married_?"

"Nah! 'Course not. Just…Guess I loved 'er even then. Didn't know it, but…" Daryl shrugs.

"So how did you not think about it?" Raul asks.

"Kept busy."

Raul nods and hands the bottle over.

Daryl peers inside. It's empty, so he lays it on its side on the cement and rolls it, down the ramp toward the second floor of the garage. They can hear it clink and crack against a post below. "Word to the wise, kid?"

"What?"

"Don't go all the way with 'er. That way if she gets knocked up, y'll know it ain't yers. 'Cause if she does get knocked up – yer the one she's running to, no matter who the daddy is. 'Cause ya got shit stored up, 'n ya work hard."

"Well…that wouldn't be so bad."

"Raisin' another man's kid?" Daryl asks.

"Aren't you?"

"'S bit diffr'n. Ain't Carol's kid neither."

"Isn't Garland?" Raul asks. "I mean, Gary's dad was clearly not Garland. Whoever hid dad was, he was black, right?"

"Yeah." Daryl nods. "Yer right. Ain't nothin' wrong with raisin' another man's kid. Just don't want ya to let 'er use ya, little brother."

Raul shifts from cross-legged to his knees up and his arms around them. "You think she's a user?"

"Didn't say that. Hardly know 'er. But she's got three balls in the air right now."

Raul laughs. "Six balls more like."

Daryl rolls his eyes.

"Awwww….shit." Raul lets go of his knees. "Fuck, you're right. I _can't_ let myself think about it. Her with one of them. And now I _am_ thinking about it. How do I stop?"

"Gettin' shitfaced might help," Daryl tells him. "Not on the regular. But maybe just for tonight."

"But the bottle's empty. And I'm not even really buzzed."

"Thirty-seven bottles left right now. What's our cut?" Daryl asks.

"Well, ten percent of thirty-seven bottles is 3.7. Round up to four, and we keep two bottles each."

"Thirty-six bottles," Daryl says. "What's our cut?"

"Well….3.6, round up to 4. Still two."

"Thirty-five bottles," Daryl says. "What's our cut?"

"3.5. And 5 rounds up. So…still two."

"What don't come back, don't come back."

Raul grins. "So you're saying we can drink two more bottles of wine and still have the same cut?"

Daryl taps his forehead. "Now yer thinkin'."

[*]

It's Christmas in September when Daryl returns to Jamestown the next evening. Carol's worried by the time he does, because she expects him to be back in the afternoon, not after Sweetheart is already asleep for the night. A low fire crackles softly in the living room. The temperature has dipped to 60 degrees tonight, and so the fire provides a reasonable source of light without overheating the cabin. Carol is sitting on the couch, absently sewing up a rip in a pair of Daryl's pants, and thinking about whether to ask Garland to organize a search party in the morning, when the door flies open.

Daryl walks in wearing some kind of strange, navy blue cape that makes him look like he just stepped off an 18th century battlefield, except there's a crossbow on his shoulder instead of a musket. Dog barks happily.

"Shh!" Carol orders the canine. "Baby's sleeping." She drops her sewing and comes to Daryl for a big hug and a kiss while Dog sniffs a half circle around his heels.

Daryl scratches behind the canine's ears and orders him back to the rug. Dog hangs his head and reluctantly obeys. After dropping his pack, Daryl hangs his bow on a hook out of Sweetheart's crawling reach and even proceeds to take off his boots. Carol's housetrained him. Mostly. When he whisks the cape off his shoulders and tosses it over the back of the kitchen chair, she picks it up and hangs it on one of the hooks on the back of the door.

"'S hot in here," he says. "Why'd ya light the fire?"

"For the light. If you don't wear that cloak around the cabin, I'm sure you'll be fine in a minute. Where'd you get it?"

"Museum of the American Revolution."

"Ah." She rests a hand on his chest and looks up into his eyes. "I was worried. I thought you'd be back sooner."

"Yeah. Sorry. Way overslept. Got a late start. 'N then we ran into some trouble on the way back."

"What kind of trouble?" Carol asks. "Walkers or men?"

"Potholes. Had to unload the whole damn cart to fix a wheel. Then reload it."

"Well I'm glad you're home safely."

He goes to peek in on Sweetheart and then returns to the living room, where he tugs Carol to his chest, nuzzles her neck with his nose, and then whispers in her ear, "Brought presents."

She pulls back smiling. "I love presents."

"Sit down on the couch 'n close yer eyes."

Carol does what she's asked and hears him rustling in his pack. "No peekin'!" he orders, so she covers her eyes with her hand. "Tell ya when." She hears things clomping down on the coffee table, and then he says "Now."

Carol opens her eyes to an amazing assortment of goodies. There are _two_ whole bottles of wine, an entire jar of instant coffee crystals, several individually wrapped tea bags, and an entire cannister of sugar. There's also a stack of books. "Did you…Daryl, did you report what you scavenged to – "

"'S just m'cut. We found that damn much."

She laughs happily. She turns one of the bottles of wine to read the label. "Malbec. My favorite. You remembered."

"Mhmh," he agrees, with an innocent look that suggests he didn't remember. He just made a lucky guess. "Other one's row say."

Carol looks at the various parenting and children's books he picked up and finds, wedged among them, _The Modern Kama Sutra_. Did he seriously bring home a sex book? She slides it out and turns the cover toward him with a skeptical look on her face.

He shrugs. "Thought we could try out some new stuff."

"Are you bored, Pookie?"

"Nah! Ain't bored. Just wanna keep things fresh. Ya know, we been married a long time."

"We've been married less than a year and a half."

"Well, 's the longest _I've_ ever been married."

She chuckles. "Okay. I'm game. What are you thinking?" She flips through the book. "Or did you really just take this book for the pictures?"

"That woman ain't even hot," Daryl says.

"The man's pretty buff, though."

"Hey!" Daryl snatches the book back and looks at one of the pictures. "Pffft."

Carol chuckles. "So which position do you want to try tonight?"

He grins. "We're havin' sex tonight?"

"I missed you. So pick a page."

Looking like an excited teenager, he starts flipping through the book. He finally settles on a page and turns the open book toward her.

"Oh, God no," she says. "Do you think I'm a gymnast? I'm not that flexible anymore. If I ever was. Pick another one."

He takes back the book and flips through it some more before turning it toward her.

Carol looks at the photo and description. "Mhmmm…I don't think anybody really ever gets off properly that way. It's like trying to walk and chew gum at the same time."

"Fine. You pick one then."

Carol takes the book, leans back against the couch cushion, and pages through it. Her lips pressed tightly together so he doesn't know she's trying not to smile, she hands the book to him open to the page depicting "missionary style."

He looks at the picture. She awaits his frustrated, groaning reaction, but he just says. "A'right. Fine. 'S always reliable."

Carol stands, takes the book, and snaps it shut. "I'm teasing. We'll do something different tonight. But we don't need a book. Let's just take off all our clothes and see where the evening leads us."

Daryl whistles to Dog and shoos him off the rug. "Spot's ours tonight." Dog whimpers but trots over to Sweetheart's room, where he crawls under the drapes and probably lays himself down on the small circular rug before the rocking chair.

Carol goes to get a blanket to lay over the rug. She loves the idea of making love before the lit fireplace – which it's been too hot to do until tonight - but she's not rolling around in dog hair.

[*]

Daryl groans at the sound of his name. He's so damn tired. He might have been a little bit hungover yesterday morning after drinking all that wine with Raul, and then there was the exhausting trip home to Jamestown, followed by Carol fucking his brains out. He can't possibly move now.

"Daryl!"

He opens one eye. Carol is standing before him with Sweetheart on her hip. The little girl chews on her own finger as she looks down at him, splayed stomach down on the bearskin rug, a sheet draped over half his naked body.

"Rise and shine, Pookie. Mitch is here." Daryl, blinking against the sunlight, rolls over and sees Mitch standing by the front door.

Mitch waves. "Hey. You were supposed to meet me at the front gate a half an hour ago to go hunting. Do you need me to get a different hunting partner today? Barry said he could use the overtime."

"Fuck no. Ain't gonna stick ya with that asshole. Just give me a sec to dress." Daryl, not really thinking about the fact that he's buck naked beneath the sheet, flings it off and stands up.

Mitch's eyes flit down for a moment and then back up. With a twitch of a smile on his face, he says, "I'll wait for you outside."


	128. Chapter 128

October passes quickly. It's a good thing the month is busy, because otherwise the days would crawl in anticipation for Carol. She's growing increasingly excited about seeing Henry and old friends and has been anxiously wondering how the three camps have prospered these past several months. Did the Kingdom people settle well into their new communities? Have marriages been forged or fallen apart? How much have Judith and RJ and Hershel grown? Did the Hilltop have a bountiful summer crop? Was Oceanside battered by storm? Is Alexandria still a green mecca of energy? Is the Alliance living in peace, or have they run into a group like the Saviors and been ravaged by war?

But there's enough work and family life to distract her from these thoughts. The council has had to prepare for the trade trip by extensively reviewing the community inventory, measuring cargo space on the _Susan Constant_ , and deciding what to bring for trade. Maps have been unfolded and marked and measured. Construction on the dorm is ahead of schedule, and the smokehouse is brimming with venison that will help them through leaner times in winter, for which Garland credits Daryl.

Sweetheart is now crawling like a wind-up toy and pulling up everywhere. She's into absolutely everything. Daryl has taught her some baby sign language from a book he picked up in Yorktown, and she now tells them with her hands when she wants more or when she's all done with eating. She waves hello and goodbye, shakes her head no, and nods her head yes. She makes a hand motion like the waving of tail when she wants to see Dog. She hasn't spoken her first word yet – at least, not with obvious meaning – but she babbles constantly, as if she's always delivering an engaging monologue. Her eye color seems to have settled into a stunning, light hazel, although "settled" is not quite the right word for eyes that look different in every light. Her soft brown hair has grown quickly and curls sweetly at the neckline. She's able to walk for a little between her parents, with each one holding a hand to support her, and she cruises around furniture while using it for support, but she's never taken more than one step on her own before tumbling into a crawl.

Meanwhile, VanDaryl has learned to roll himself across the floor, stomach to back and back to stomach, from one end of the Barron cabin to the other, which has left Shannon frazzled. He's begun eating a few solids, and smiles often, but he still doesn't make much noise. That's for the best, Shannon says, because Gary fills the house with his constant chatter about dinosaurs, using surprisingly long sentences for a child who is not yet three and a half. He's learned to ride a tricycle and had his fair share of scrapes tipping over when he hits sticks or rocks as he careens around the fort like a race car driver.

Carol's busy serving on the council, working for the sheriff's department, raising her active little girl, and tending their own private garden, as well as the herbs she keeps in small pots on the windowsills.

And as if all that wasn't enough, Carol has also been sewing a ladybug costume for Sweetheart and making rock candy using Daryl's share of the scavenged sugar. Jamestown, she's learned, carries out the Old World tradition of Halloween.

And Halloween is tomorrow.

Carol's just now sewing the final black circle on the red fluffy shell Sweetheart will don for trick or treating. She'll wear a black t-shirt and little black sweatpants for the body. Meanwhile, Sweetheart plays with her big, soft blocks on the floor. She puts one on top of the other and then squeals at her own accomplishment.

"Good job!" Carol tells her. "Yay!"

Sweetheart claps for herself.

"Book says they don't do that 'til eighteen months," Daryl says proudly from the armchair where he's sitting and waxing the strings of his crossbow.

"Oh, that can't be true," Carol says.

"'S true," Daryl insists. "And she ain't barely eleven months. Tellin' ya. M'girl's a genius." Moving his bow away from his face so Sweetheart can see him, he says, "Good job! Good job, Sweetie! Yer daddy's girl, aren't ya?"

Sweetheart laughs and picks up another block. She holds it out to Daryl.

"No, you do it. You can do it," he tells her. "Put it right on top!" He gestures. "On top."

Sweetheart draws back the block. She looks at it curiously, and then looks at Daryl.

"On top," he repeats with a gesture.

Sweetheart smiles mischievously. Then she sets the block down hard atop the other two, and they all fall over when she let's go. "Uh-oh!" she says. "Uh-oh!"

Carol gasps and looks at Daryl. "That's a word," she says. "That's definitely a word that she meant to say and that meant what she meant it to mean!"

"Try sayin' that five times fast," Daryl tells the baby. "Sounds like a tongue twister, don't it?"

Carol sets her sewing aside. "I have to write it down in the book. First word! Pookie, first word!"

"Still think 'er first word was Dada," Daryl grumbles as he goes back to waxing the strings of his bow.

"That was just babbling." Carol finds the _Journal of My First Year_ , a fill-in-the blank book Daryl picked up for her from the bookstore in Yorktown, and writes _uh-oh_ under first word. She's gone back and logged all of Sweetheart's accomplishments since the time they got her. She's also put Sweetheart's handprints and footprints in the book, as well as a lock her hair, and she got Deputy Andrew to draw a second quick sketch of her in one of the rectangles where you're supposed to paste photos.

When she sits back down to resume her sewing, Sweetheart has crawled over to Daryl and pulled up on his knees. He sets his bow on the floor and lifts her into her lap, at which point she tries to get out of his lap to get at the bow. "Oh, so it wasn't me ya wanted, huh?" Daryl asks her. She tries to squirm out of his arms and over the chair, but he stands up and, holding her tightly, picks up his bow and hangs it out of her reach before setting her down on the floor and sitting down with her to stack the blocks.

"What are you going to be for Halloween?" Carol asks.

"Me?" Daryl replies. "Hell ya talkin' 'bout? I ain't a kid."

"But you're taking her trick or treating."

He's going with Garland and Gary and VanDaryl, while Shannon plans to come over and hand out the rock candy with Carol. They're having their own little mother's night in. Carol's already put the paper pumpkin on the cabin door to indicate they welcome trick or treaters. She's told about half the huts and cabins participate, and the "treats" are often strange – pencils, Old World money, spoons, and various other odds and ends - but it's more about the kids having fun than getting candy. But _this_ year, they _are_ going to get rock candy – from the best damn cabin on the block.

Carol always wanted to be _that_ house – the house all the kids talked about when they went home with their pillowcases full of loot – the one with the full-size candy bars. But Ed wouldn't hear of spending so much money on a "stupid beggar's holiday," as he called it. In fact, when she'd take Sophia out trick-or-treating, he'd turn out all the lights – except for the glowing TV – shut the blinds, and sit in his recliner and drink beer.

"So what?" Daryl asks. " _I_ ain't trick or treatin'."

"You could go as George Washington," Carol suggests. "Wear your cape and borrow Raul's tricorner hat. Put on your black boots and see if Earl will lend you his Civil War sword."

"Ain't gonna wear no dumbass costume."

"Fine. Then _I'll_ do it and answer the door as George Washington."

"Sounds better." Daryl puts a third block on top of the fourth.

Sweetheart knocks the tower over. "Uh oh!"

"Ain't an uh-oh if ya do it on purpose," Daryl tells her.

After dinner, they gut their pumpkins – every adult in Jamestown was rationed a whole one - salt and roast the seeds in a pan over the fireplace (that will be great snacking for weeks), and carve jack-o-lanterns. Carol purees the innards to use for pie filling and vegetable stock, and stores them in a cooler.

"'S mean I'm gettin' pumpkin pie tomorrow?" Daryl asks.

"Maybe," Carol tells him with a smile.

[*]

The next afternoon, Daryl is heading to his cabin after washing up from hunting when Raul falls in step beside him. The young man extends him his black, tricorner hat. "Carol wanted this?"

"Bring it on in," Daryl says. "Have some beer." He stops before his door and seizes the deer antler handle.

"You have beer?"

"Carol let me trade the tavern m'instant coffee crystals for a growler." Daryl opens the door and leads Raul inside.

Raul shakes his head. "I told you to hold onto that."

"Jar was only two-thirds full. 'N I got a whole damn growler, man!" Daryl drops his pack. "64 ounces!"

Raul tosses the tricorner hat on the kitchen table. "In six months, it'll get you _two_ growlers. Maybe even _three_."

Daryl hangs his bow. "In six months I could be dead."

"Well that's bleak!" Raul says. "Let's hope not."

"Merle used to tell me to live every day like it's yer last." He opens the cooler and pulls out the growler. "'Course, that might be why he never got anywhere in life." He takes out two pint glasses and pours them three-fourths full. Carol is still at work and hasn't picked up Sweetheart from Shannon's yet.

The men slide onto the couch and sip.

"Make sure you bring Sweetheart by our cabin tonight," Raul says. "My dad and I are giving out bouncy balls. He emptied out an entire one of those 25-cent machines when he was last out scavenging."

"Mhm. Dunno. Sounds like a chokin' hazard."

"Well, just about everything you get tonight is going to be."

"Yeah, dunno why Carol wants me to take 'er. Guess she just wants to get us out the house so she can party with Shannon."

Raul chuckles.

"Ain't ya goin' to the Halloween party in the tavern?" Daryl's heard that's how a lot of the singles spend Halloween night. The tavern is already decorated, with two jack-o-lanterns outside, fake cobwebs above the saloon door, a spooky candelabra near the stage, and orange, pumpkin-shaped glass candle holders on every table. There's supposed to be live music. Someone's bound to be singing "Thriller."

Raul shrugs. "Kelly's going as Harry's date."

"Thought Harry got Sunday afternoons."

"He does, but, it's Thursday night. That's not any of our days. So she just picked one of us. And it wasn't me." Raul takes a long sip of the beer. "I'd rather not watch them sucking face on the dance floor."

"Maybe ya oughtta chase someone else."

"Who?" Raul asks.

"Dunno. Anika?" She's about the same age as Kelly. They both sleep and work in the orphanage in the museum.

"She's in an exclusive thing with – whatshisname - Inola's brother?"

"Adahay."

"Yeah. And he's like…fifteen years older than her. I guess that's not unusual anymore."

Daryl shrugs. "Hell, wasn't that unusual in the old world. I once fucked a woman twenty years older 'n me."

"Really?" Raul asks. "How old were _you_?"

"Twenty-one."

"How'd you even meet her? Was she your college professor or something?"

"Pfffft. Think _I_ went to college?"

Raul smiles and shrugs.

"Merle picked 'er and 'er daughter up at some bar. Daughter was my age. Merle wanted the daughter. Told me to _entertain_ the mother. Probably should have been the other way 'round, but Merle liked 'em young."

"And you liked them older?" Raul asks.

"Didn't much like any of 'em, really. But Merle would throw me his scraps every now 'n then. Got in, got off, got out. I was a piece of shit." Daryl takes a swig of his beer.

"My dad says it's always better with someone you love."

"Yer dad's right." It sounds like Raul is finally talking to his father about more than just the weather. "Ain't just better. 'S whole diff'rn thing."

"I don't know if I love Kelly, but it sure is nice." Raul smiles bashfully and brings his pint glass to his lips. After he sips, he says, "I took your advice, though. We haven't gone all the way."

"Good."

"I'm probably going to die a virgin. I mean…a technical virgin."

"So what if ya do?" Daryl asks.

"Easy for you to say. Do you - " Raul falls silent and flushes red when Carol walks in with Sweetheart on her hip.

"Hello, Raul."

"Hey, Carol, I brought you that hat for your costume." Raul stands. "Thanks for the beer. I'll get out of your hair."

"Stay," Carols says. "Finish."

"Yeah…umm…I have to get ready for the trick or treaters." He hastens off, leaving a good three ounces of liquid in his glass. Daryl pours it into his own.

"Did I interrupt an embarrassing conversation?" asks Carol as she puts the baby down.

"Nah. Need help?"

"An unsolicited offer of help? I think I _did_ interrupt something. But, yes, she needs her diaper changed."

[*]

When Garland and Shannon arrive at the Dixon cabin, VanDaryl is facing outward in the baby carrier on Garland's chest. He wears an orange, long sleeve onesie with a green felt cap on his head. Gary, who is wearing a sheet with two holes cut out for the eyes, shouts, "Trick or Treat!"

"Not yet, son," Garland tells him. "We'll hit the Dixon house last. We're just picking up Daryl and Sweetheart."

"What a cute little pumpkin." Carol, who is holding a costumed Sweetheart on her hip, shakes VanDaryl's hand affectionately. The baby smiles sleepily.

"You put a lot more work into Sweetheart's costume," Shannon says. "Adorable!" She wiggles the antennas that spring from the headband on Sweetheart's head. Sweetheart reaches up and tries to swat the headband off.

"I'm not sure she's going to keep it on, though." Carol hands the baby over to Daryl, who steps outside and sets her in the Red Radio Flyer wagon Garland has brought to pull Gary when he's inevitably too tired to walk back to the cabin at the end of the festivities. The wagon has brown wood slats high enough to keep her from falling out, at least until she pulls up. But for now, Sweetheart just sits and looks around.

"I hear you have Yorktown wine," Shannon whispers as she closes the front door on the men and children.

"I've been saving the second bottle to share with you," Carol agrees. "But remember you have to feed both babies before bed."

Shannon waves her hand dismissively. "Hardly any gets in the milk. I won't feed either one for over an hour, and they're going to be so wound up tonight. A little taste might help them to settle down and sleep."

"Well, I'm limiting you to one and a half glasses."

"You're drinking three and a half?" Shannon asks with a raised eyebrow.

"No, I'm saving two for tomorrow." Carol grabs the corkscrew and begins working loose the cork.

Shannon – who knows her way around the Dixon kitchen after a few dinner visits, takes down two wine glasses. "You're sweet to share."

"You're sweet to keep breastfeeding Sweetheart through the spring," Carol tells her. Gunther warned her that her plan to wean in December was inadvisable, since the milking and resting and calving cycle means farm milk production will slow, and milk will have to be tightly rationed through the winter.

"Well, to be honest, I was starting to feel a little anxious about giving up my special time with my goddaughter," Shannon says. " _I'll_ be more ready in the spring. And it's just twenty minutes twice a day now. She's _very_ efficient."

"I'm a little jealous," Carol admits as she pours the wine.

"Well, don't be too jealous. I still don't want Garland to touch them half the time."

Carol chuckles and hands her a glass.

"I keep my man satisfied, though," Shannon assures her before taking a sip. "Oh, this is outstanding. I heard only one of the bottles the tavern opened was turned." The other wine bottles all went to the tavern to be sold by the glass, with the proceeds, of course, going to the communal pantry.

There's a knock at the door. Shannon bounces a little in place.

Carol smiles and sets down her wine glass. "Our first trick-or-treater!" She picks up the tricorner hat, seizes the bowl of rock candy, and with Daryl's cape flowing all the way to her ankles, heads for the door.


	129. Chapter 129

Gunther stands at the door with a seven- or eight-year-old boy – Johnny, if Carol remembers correctly. Although the orphans all room together in the orphanage in the museum, where they're like one big family, each has an adult who has volunteered to work extra hours for the child's rations and schooling. Many of the sponsors also spend time with their orphans, in a big brother fashion, taking them to movies, stopping by to toss a ball, giving small gifts, or – as tonight - taking their orphans trick-or-treating.

"Trick or treat!" little Johnny shouts. He wears a black cape and a white t-shirt.

"What a terrifying vampire!" Shannon exclaims as she joins Carol in the doorway, her wine still in her hand.

"I'm a dark angel," the boy says.

Shannon looks at Gunther questioningly. He shrugs. Carol hands the boy a piece of rock candy on a stick. She's wrapped the candy in tissue paper to keep it clean in case the kids put it in their baskets or pillowcases. Johnny has a cloth tote bag. The boy takes the candy and asks, "What is it?"

"Rock candy," Carol tells him.

"What do you say?" Gunther asks.

"I don't know what rock candy is."

"No, what do you say to the lady?"

"Oh, sorry. Thank you." Johnny proceeds to put the rock candy in his mouth, tissue paper and all. "Ewww!" He yanks it out.

"Take the paper off," Gunther tells him. "Then try it."

Johnny unravels the now wet tissue paper and simply discards it on the ground. Gunther sighs and stoops down, picks up the paper, and shoves it in the pocket of his jean jacket. Johnny shoves the unpapered rock candy into his mouth, and his eyes light up like saucers. He pulls it out and cries, "Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"

"Guess we should have saved the best house for last," Gunther says. "Who knew? Now it's all going to be downhill from here." He smiles. "Happy Halloween to both of you." Gunther puts a hand on Johnny's back and ushers the boy, who is sucking his rock candy grotesquely, onward.

[*]

The wagon creeks as Daryl tugs it to a stop and plucks Sweetheart out. This is their tenth stop, and he gave up on the antenna headband after the second. That piece of the costume lies discarded in the wagon. Carol would keep putting it back on, no doubt, but he's not Carol.

"This house is a two-for-one," Garland tells Gary. "We'll just go around back to Sheriff Earl's entrance when we're done here."

Daryl sets Sweetheart on his own feet and, holding both her hands, walks her to the door. Gary is already knocking. Judge Ana Carter – though she's not a _Carter_ anymore - Daryl doesn't know her maiden name – answers. Her baby bump is glaringly obvious now. She's probably got four months until she pops.

"Twick or Tweat!" Gary shouts and holds out his open pillowcase.

"Look at all these great costumes," Ana exclaims. "A pumpkin, a ghost, and a ladybug!"

Daryl wonders how long this whole thing's going to take and how many people are going to keep naming all the costumes as if it's rocket science to figure them out.

Ana lowers a bowl full of miscellaneous little toys and tells Gary to pick one. Gary fishes around and takes a wooden top. Earl appears in the doorway beside her. "Happy Halloween!" he says.

"Teaming up today?" Garland asks.

Earl leans against the door frame. "Seemed efficient."

"We're…" Ana puts a hand on the sheriff's shoulder. "Earl and I are in relationship counseling now. With that psychologist. We're considering getting back together."

Earl shifts on his feet, as if he's embarrassed to admit he might be willing to take her back. He hooks his thumbs into his belt loops. " _Considering_."

"Well, I hope it works out whatever way it should," Garland tells them. "Happy Halloween."

When the door shuts, Daryl puts Sweetheart back in the wagon. He didn't bother taking a toy for her – they're all choking hazards anyway. The girl has no idea what's going on. She probably thinks she's just out for a walk with her daddy, but she seems happy enough. Right now she's banging on the bottom of the wagon and enjoying its metallic clang. VanDaryl is asleep in the baby carrier on Garland's chest. His little head droops sideways and the green felt cap has fallen down half over his eyes. The trick or treating is all for Gary.

"I thought that might happen," Garland says as they stroll on. "Which is part of why I wanted Ana and Captain Cummins both off the council. If they're working together and seeing each other almost every day, Earl and Ana don't stand a chance. But with those two hardly crossing paths now, and with the captain at sea for a week in November…maybe. Just maybe."

As he tugs the wagon, Daryl says, "Dunno if I could do that."

"Don't know if I could either. Thank God we've both got loyal women, and we'll never have to find out."

"Mhmhm."

Gary stops in his tracks and points up in the sky. "Bats!" The black-in-the-night creatures swoop and dip and shoot up like acrobats, circle and dip and swoop again before pumping their wings and flying off toward the back fence of Jamestown.

"Indeed," Garland tells him. "The perfect day for it. Let's just hope Gunther has a plan to keep them out of the orchard." He turns to Daryl. "Can you eat bats?"

" _Can_ ," Daryl replies. "Can eat any damn thing. Smell like piss when ya cook 'em though."

"And what do they taste like?"

"Chicken." The wagon squeaks behind Daryl as Sweetheart babbles softly.

"Of course. What doesn't?"

"Wouldn't risk it though. Too many diseases."

"Then how do you know what they smell and taste like?" Garland asks.

"Hungry enough to risk it once."

Garland looks up at the three-quarters moon as they exit the fence line that surrounds the fort and turn up the path toward the Indian Village. "Halloween. It's like getting to re-live your childhood, isn't it?" When Daryl grunts uncertainly, Garland asks, "I know you had it rough as a kid, but you at least went trick-or-treating didn't you?"

"Oh yeah. Went. Wasn't fun though. More like a mission. 'N if I didn't come back with enough candy, m'daddy would beat m'ass. He always took half m'loot. The rest he let me keep, 'cause that was breakfast 'n lunch for the next week."

"And you've still got all your teeth?"

"Missin' one in the back. But that didn't happen 'til a few years ago. Lucky I guess. M'daddy was missin' three. Merle, two."

"What did you dress up as?" Garland asks.

"Ain't like m'mama sewed me a costume." He glances back at the ladybug costume Carol so lovingly made. He turns forward again. "Had to improvise. Wore m'grandaddy's old construction hat one year. He left it behind when he died. Wore a baseball cap one year, with a football jersey. Said I was a baseball player."

Garland chuckles.

Daryl nods to Gary's ghost costume. "Did that once. Last year m'mama was alive. She tore into me when I got back for cuttin' up the sheet, 'cause we only had one per bed."

"So you don't have fond memories of Halloween," Garland says. He points to Sweetheart, who has her hands on either side of the wagon's guardrails and is looking up at the moon and stars in wonder. "But you're going to."

[*]

Carol and Shannon drink and chat between visitors, enjoying some much needed girl time. This time, as she prepares to open the door, Carol can hear through it the excited chatter on the other side: "This is it! This is the cabin!"

"This is the one?"

"They said the one with the fancy door!"

Carol smiles. Yep. She's _that_ house now. She opens the door to find Mitch and Lieutenant Witherspoon. It gives her a surprise to see them together. Lieutenant Witherspoon still hasn't publicly come out of the closet, and when he and Mitch do hang out in public, it's usually because they "happened" to run into each other at the tavern. Maybe they "happened" to run into each other while trick-or-treating tonight. She knew Mitch sponsored an orphan, but she didn't know the lieutenant did. Lieutenant Witherspoon's little boy wears a red clown nose and wig. Mitch's little girl has a tiara and wand and a sparkly dress – with combat boots.

"Trick or treat!" the kids chorus.

When they receive the rock candy, they immediately thank her, tear the paper off, and shove it into their mouths.

"Happy Halloween, Carol," the lieutenant says.

Mitch looks Carol over. "George Washington?"

"You guessed it."

Mitch's eyes turn to Shannon, who has just joined Carol in the doorway. "Marilyn Monroe."

Shannon laughs. "I didn't think anyone would get it! I'm not blonde and everyone always thinks of her in that white dress, not in the black turtleneck." Shannon puts a hand on the neck of her black sweater. "But this is almost exactly like what she wore in that _Time_ photo shoot."

"It's not just the turtleneck," Mitch tells her. "It's the way you did your hair."

Shannon pushes up one of her red, wavy curls. "You like that?" She taps a spot on her face, and for the first time this evening, Carol realizes she's made a tan circle there with some kind of makeup or face paint. "And don't forget the mole."

"Gorgeous as always," Mitch tells her.

"Uh…" Lieutenant Witherspoon jerks his head. "We better catch up to the kids. They're already at the next cabin."

"Happy Halloween to both of you," Carol calls as they jog after their orphans. She closes the door and turns to Shannon. "I didn't even realize you were dressed up. I'm sorry."

Shannon laughs. "I told Garland I was going to dress up like I did in my college stripper days, and he just about lost his mind. I was only teasing, of course, but he believed me for a minute. Then I told him I was going to be Marilyn Monroe, and he wasn't all that much happier. Until I showed him the turtleneck. I swear, he'd put me in a burqa if he could."

"I doubt that," Carol says as she heads back to the counter to pluck up her wine glass. "He likes your spunk."

"He _does_ like my spunk." Shannon throws herself down into the armchair and takes a sip of her wine. "And he _did_ suggest I wear the stripper costume _after_ curfew, when Gary and VanDaryl are in bed."

Carol chuckles. "Are you going to?" She sits on the end of the couch.

"I don't _have_ a stripper's costume!" Shannon shrugs. "Well, I do have some lingerie Garland scavenged for me from a Victoria's Secret three years ago. So, if he's a good boy tonight, he might get a private show."

[*]

Dante and Inola are sitting outside their hut near their grill. The lid is shut, but the smell of cinnamon wafts through the air. "Twick or tweat!" Gary cries, holding out his pillowcase.

Dante stands and lifts the lid of the grill, takes a pair of tongs, and puts a slice of baked apple on a paper napkin. "Should probably let it cool a little, but eat it before it gets cold." He extends the napkin to Garland. Gary looks up at the apple slice and licks his lips. "Does Sweetheart want one?" he asks Daryl. "They're really soft. You could probably pinch it off into pieces for her."

"Hell, I'll eat it if she don't."

Dante adds another slice to the napkin.

"Smells good," Daryl says. "Carol might have competition for the best treats in town."

"Oh, I don't think so," Inola says. "We've heard _all_ about the rock candy from every kid who's come by."

As they move on, Daryl stops intermittently to pinch off and smush up some baked apple and feed it to Sweetheart off his fingertip. Her eyes grow adorably wide every time she licks it off his finger, and she hums as she works it around in her mouth before swallowing.

"You clearly aren't going to get to taste any," Garland says.

"Lick m'fingers when she's done," Daryl says.

Garland makes a disgusted face.

"What? 'S just a little baby slobber."

Sweetheart and Gary finish off their apple slices, and then they finish trick or treating at the last hut. They can hear the music and laughter drifting from the tavern. "Can we trick or treat there?" Daryl asks. "Will they give us daddies a shot?"

"If only. Time to turn around."

Daryl swings the wagon in a half circle and Sweetheart falls over backward with a clang. She looks temporarily dazed. She opens her little mouth like she's about to cry when Daryl says, "Yer fine!"

She closes her mouth and sits back up.

[*]

Dog sniffs curiously at the pile of loot Gary has dumped onto the bear skin rug. The little boy sorts his treats into pile as he happily sucks on his rock candy. Shannon nurses a sleepy Sweetheart on the couch, while VanDaryl snoozes against Garland's chest as he sits next to her. "He'll wake up in an hour," Shannon tells Carol, who is in the armchair, "and then I'll feed him, and he'll be down for a solid ten hours after that. It's _amazing_. It's like I have a whole new lease on life! And he'll nap an hour and a half in the morning and an hour and half in the afternoon." She looks down at Sweetheart at her breast. "Of course you're down to just one, you naughty bug."

"But she sleeps eleven to twelve hours at night still," Carol replies. It's past Sweetheart's usual bedtime, but it's a special occasion.

The cabin door opens and Daryl returns with the water he's drawn from the well for their wash basin. He puts it in the bedroom and then joins the others, where he stands with an arm slung over the mantle.

"There was nothing in Sweetheart's pumpkin," Carol tells him.

"'Cause she aint' old 'nuff for none of that."

"Next year, you get to hand out treats and I'll take her."

"Ya just want a bouncy ball for yerself," Daryl tells her.

"Maybe," Carol admits.

Gary snatches up a plastic dinosaur from among his pile of loot. "Roar!" he says. "Twan-a-soar-us Wex likes meat! He will eat you all up, Unca Dahwal!" When he attacks Daryl's knee with the plastic dinosaur, Daryl pretends to be injured. It's a little too convincing because Gary jumps back and says. "I'm sawy! I'm sawy!"

"'M fine," Daryl assures him, standing straight again. He taps his knee. "See?"

"Oh." Gary goes back to sorting his treats. He holds up a little booklet toward his mother. "What is it?"

"Oh Good Lord!" Shannon exclaims. "Who gave out the Bible tracts?"

"Who do you think?" Garland asks. "Mrs. Conway."

Daryl gives Carol a look that says – bitch deserved to have her strawberries snatched.

"Did she do that last year?" Shannon asks.

"Last year it was little slips of paper with Bible verses."

Shannon shakes her head. "There's always one."

"We had a dentist on our block." Carol tells them, "who gave out dental floss and toothbrushes."

"Oh, he got dental floss, too," Garland says, "but we could actually use that."

Shannon pulls Sweetheart from her breast and lowers her shirt. She hands the baby over to Carol to burp. "Gare Bear, gather all your treats," Shannon tells him. "We're going home soon."

"I spend the night with Uncle Dahwal!"

"No, not tonight," Garland tells him. "Another night maybe. _Both_ kids." He looks hopefully from Carol to Daryl.

"Of course," Carol says. "You're going to have Sweetheart for a week while we're gone. We'd be happy to take the kids for a night or two next week."

When everyone's gone, and Sweetheart is asleep in her crib, Carol pulls the pumpkin pie out. She made it before the trick or treating started, but wouldn't let Daryl touch it yet. "Your turn for a treat, Pookie."

"Mmmm." He follows her to the kitchen table, surrounds her with his arms from behind, and kisses her ear. "'N do I get a treat _after_ the treat?"

"We'll see," she replies with a smile. "Sit down and eat your pie."

Daryl grins lecherously, slides into the kitchen chair, and happily picks up his fork. "Think I like Halloween now."


	130. Chapter 130

The sun rises over Jamestown as golden leaves drift from the trees beyond the fence and float down to coat the edges of the camp. Sweetheart squeals and bounces on her bottom before the Barron fireplace, across from VanDaryl, who has learned to sit up well on his own without falling over. Dog lies between them, like a dividing line, his head on his paws.

"We've weaned her from the pacifier so I'm not giving you one of those," Carol tells Shannon. "She has to have the stuffed bunny in her crib at night or she won't fall asleep, and she gets cold now that it's November, but she won't go to sleep in anything but the short-sleeve onesie. So she needs blankets. I've brought her favorite blanket and her second favorite blanket. She's just going to roll over on her stomach, and that's fine, I don't try to turn her over. She likes the _Hungry Caterpillar_ book best. That's one's her favorite. You have to read it first before any of –"

"-Carol," Shannon interrupts gently. "I know. I know all this." She puts a comforting hand on Carol's shoulder. "She's going to be just fine. Look how happy she is already."

Sweetheart has just plunged over Dog and put her palms down on either side of the rug to stare straight in VanDaryl's face. She laughs when VanDaryl rears back uncertainly.

"I know." Carol takes a deep breath. "I just want to be sure."

"It's hard. I get it."

Daryl plucks Sweetheart up from the rug and gives her a hug and a kiss. "Kiss mommy goodbye," he orders as he brings her over to Carol.

Carol has a hard time releasing Sweetheart from the hug, but the baby squirms enough that she finally lets her go back to the rug, the Dog, and her little friend.

At least Sweetheart doesn't cry when they slip out the door and shut it behind themselves, but she's also used to being left with Shannon for babysitting. It will be awhile before she notices they aren't coming back to get her for the evening, and then she may not understand that they _are_ coming back at all. The idea almost breaks Carol's heart.

"She's with family," Daryl murmurs gently now, his eyes tenderly sweeping her face.

Carol nods. Judith always weathered Rick's temporary absences well enough. Sweetheart will weather theirs, too, Carol assures herself. But there's that niggling doubt. "What if she forgets us?"

"Ain't nobody could ever forget you, Beautiful."

[*]

The _Susan Constant_ has been loaded and floats heavily alongside Jamestown's dock. The crew and trade team line the deck in a single row as Captain David Cummins, dressed in his full Navy uniform, walks the line assigning sleeping and dinning times for the journey. The kitchen is tiny and can only prepare so much at once, so the people will have to rotate through their meals in two shifts, and there are only a total of nine bunks on the ship - one in the captain's cabin, two in the second officer's cabin, and six in the sailor's quarters – so they'll need three sleeping shifts. Besides, someone has to be manning the ship at all hours.

The captain is trailed by his lieutenant-commander, whom Daryl does not know. He's a tall, broad man with thick, wavy red curls atop his head and a clean-shaven face that makes his age hard to determine. He could be thirty-two, or forty, or even forty-five. "'S that guy's name?" he whispers to Carol. She knows almost everyone.

"Arnold McBride," she whispers back.

The captain comes to a stop before Carol and turns and faces her with a smile. Carol probably doesn't find that smile so charming now that she better knows his character, Daryl thinks.

"I want you ladies," the captain looks from Carol to the veterinarian who stands to her right, "to have your privacy when sleeping. So, Carolyn, you'll have my officer's cabin from 7 p.m. until 1 a.m., and Carol, you'll have it from 1 a.m. until 8 a.m. Daryl," he turns his head toward him, "you can sleep on the floor in there with Carol if you like."

 _If_ he likes? _Of course_ he likes sleeping with his own damn wife. Daryl grunts.

"The lieutenant-commander and the lieutenant and I will be rotating out of the second officer's cabin as needed," the captain says. Then he assigns them each a dinner and breakfast shift.

Captain Cummins finishes walking the line and making his assignments before returning to the center. "I welcome you all to the _Susan Constant_!" he announces. "We'll be sailing twenty-four hours a day. The winds will determine the speed of our journey, but we should be on the shores of Oceanside in no more than seventy-two hours, which means we'll arrive in the early morning before the trade fair at the latest. I'll be in charge as long as we're on this vessel. Once on land, you will defer to the leadership of the council members who are accompanying us: Assistant Farm Manager Gunther Hamilton – Gunther, raise your hand so everyone can see you."

Gunther, who doesn't look particularly thrilled to be leaving Jamestown, raises a hand reluctantly. Carol told Daryl that he didn't apply for the trip, that Garland made him go because they needed a fifth council member to enter a treaty.

"Deputy Carol Dixon," the captain continues, and Carol raises her hand. "Deputy Thomas Mayfield, who will also be our medic if you require emergency care." Thomas waves. "Dr. Carolyn Taylor," the veterinarian raises a hand, "and our own Lieutenant James Witherspoon." The young lieutenant gives a casual salute.

Captain Cummins extends a hand to indicate the officer beside him, who stands with his hands clasped behind his back. His blue-eyes twinkle in the early morning sun beneath the wavy red hair that swoops over his forehead. "This is Lieutenant-Commander Arnold McBride, who will be in charge whenever I'm asleep."

"We ask that all passengers be willing to assist the officers if called upon to do so," McBride says in a Scottish burr, with a trilling of his r's. Daryl wonders how he ended up stranded in America at the start of the apocalypse. Surely he wasn't in the Navy back then. "Our crew is not large, so if you could all pitch in when asked, that would be helpful. You'll be slopping mess, swabbing decks, pulling ropes, whatever we need. When you're not at work, feel free to relax, play cards, sleep, play music, whatever you like - but stay out of the way of the sailors. Do not get under foot."

"There will be no quarreling or brawling onboard my ship," Captain Cummins announces loudly, "and neither of these two lovely ladies who are accompanying us" he nods his head toward Carol and Carolyn, "will be harassed in any way, or there will be swift and serious consequences."

Daryl grunts his approval.

"This is a reminder to all you men," Captain Cummins continues, pacing down the line until he stands before the center of the seamen as his lieutenant-commander dutifully follows, "but especially to my own crew." He looks back and forth along the line of crew and passengers as he speaks. "You will be on your very best behavior at Oceanside. You will behave with diplomacy and respect. You will not be crude, lewd, or – " He stops suddenly because one sailor is whispering to another. The captain cups a hand around his ear. "What was that Seaman Broderick? Did you have something to share with the group?"

"No, sir," the sailor replies nervously. He stands straight and stiff.

The captain lowers his hand and takes a step back. "Let's just address this right here and now and get it out of the way. Whatever my _private_ peccadillos may have been, that has no bearing whatsoever on my expectations of your _public_ behavior as representatives of Jamestown." There's some murmuring that quickly dies. "There will be women on this island."

A few of the men whistle, until Lieutenant-Commander McBride's stony stare silences them.

"There will be women on this island," Captain Cummins repeats, "and I know you are all eager to socialize. But you will do so gallantly, and you will not _pester_ any of the ladies you encounter with unwanted attention. You will make a concerted effort to interpret and respond to social cues."

"Seaman Harrison," Lt. Commander McBride trills, "he's talking to you."

There's laughter from the other sailors.

"You will not," the captain continues firmly, "insult our potential future trade partners with any offers of goods in exchange for sex."

"That has to be said?" Carol mutters.

"What if _they_ offer?" one of the sailors asks.

"Nobody's offering _you_ anything for sex, Seaman Jones," Lt. Commander McBride booms.

The sailors snicker.

"I mean, if _they_ offer _us_ sex in trade for goods!" Seaman Jones says. "I mean, if _they're_ the ones to offer first."

"You will not attempt to initiate any such trade," the captain replies. "And if you do, and I find you have insulted a potential ally, there will be severe and immediate consequences."

Seaman Jones stands a little straighter. "With all due respect, sir, that doesn't really answer my question. You say don't initiate, but - "

"- Don't ask indelicate questions if you don't want incomplete answers," Lt. Commander McBride interrupts. "Just use what little sense God gave you."

The seaman does not attempt to renew his inquiry, and with the crew now advised, the orders start flying. The _Susan Constant_ is a flurry of activity. Sailors pull on ropes as sails rise. Captain Cummins takes the wheel. Lt. Commander McBride hollers for the ship to be untied by a pair of sailors below. Lieutenant Witherspoon shouts orders for the river gates to be pulled open, and the _Susan Constant_ glides graciously up the river.

[*]

"I fold." Carol shields her eyes against the rays of the late afternoon sun as she throws her cards on the table. Because the wind has picked up, the _Susan Constant_ has been making excellent time for the past several hours, but it's grown cold despite the blazing sun. "I'm going to go powder my nose." She stands and draws her colonial cape closed in front. "Watch my stuff."

Daryl eyes her warily as she walks off. He doesn't like her walking around alone on a ship full of so many horny men, even though he knows damn well she can handle herself. If he tried to follow her, though, she'd be ticked off, so he just returns his attention to his hand.

"I thought that was _your_ cape?" Raul says as he tosses a chip into the pot.

" _Was_. Ain't anymore." Daryl's chip clatters into the pile. "She likes it too much." Fortunately, he found a red, black, and dark purple poncho in the community store house and paid three rounds of ammo for it. He likes it almost as much as his old poncho. _Almost_.

"Fold." Mitch turns his hand over.

"I'll sweeten the pot." Gunther puts in two more chips, and Raul and Daryl both see him.

"Whatchya got?" Daryl asks Gunther.

"Read them and weep." Gunther spreads out a full house.

"Fuck," Daryl mutters.

Gunther starts to pull the chips toward himself when Raul says, "Hold up! Hold up! I have a flush."

"A full house beats a flush," Gunther tells him.

"Oh. Yeah. I can never keep these hands straight." Raul tosses his cards on the table. "No _wonder_ Kelly didn't pick me."

"I'm sure it wasn't your lack of poker skills," Mitch assures him.

Everyone's gotten an earful about Kelly during this poker game, which Daryl thinks is a good thing. Raul's learned to talk casually with other men. He's lost his suspicious guardedness around the male species, though he'll still jerk away from another man's touch – except from Daryl or his own father.

Raul begins to shuffle the deck Gunther hands him. "Harry should be here, instead of at Jamestown with her. He's a sailor."

"He didn't apply," Gunther says. "He has a senile grandmother to care for."

Raul sighs. "I know. But I doubt that's the only reason he didn't apply. He wanted to stay behind with _her._ " He deals out the cards.

"At least she told you and Nick _before_ the trip," Mitch reasons. "Now you're both free as birds."

"I'm free as a bird now," Gunther sings.

Mitch joins in the Lynyrd Skynyrd song, "And this bird you cannot chaaaange."

"Shush it," Daryl grumbles.

They don't. Together they sing: "Lord knows I can't chaaaange."

"Ya don't shut up," Daryl warns them. "'M gonna – "

Daryl never gets to say what he's going to do. A burst of semi-automatic gunfire fills the air, followed by Lt. Commander McBride's cry of "PIRATES!" and the captain's order to "Defend! Defend!" Between the crack and pop of gunfire there comes the steady roar of what sounds like…how could it possibly be? But it sounds like an _engine._

Chairs topple backward and cards scatter across the deck as the men grab their weapons.


	131. Chapter 131

The _Susan Constant_ opens return fire on its attackers from the windows of the gun deck below as bullets fly across the top of the ship. Daryl ducks down and scurries beneath a volley of fire to a defensive position against the starboard side. His heart thuds in his chest as he wonders where Carol is. When she left the table, she left her bulky weapons, too. At least she has her knife on her, if anyone should board the ship.

Cautiously, Daryl raises his head above the rail just long enough to see what's happening. Coming at them, probably from the dock at the land mass a mile across the river, are two electric speedboats with roofs made of solar paneling. He counts six men in each boat. They're indiscriminately firing at the ship, as though they think a barrage of bullets can sink it – and maybe it can. Put enough holes in her, and she'll start taking on water.

Daryl rolls himself to a position behind a crate. If a bullet pierces through the thick wood of the ship, it probably won't make it all the way through the crate and its contents. But it's going to be almost impossible to stand up to shoot without getting shot. They'll have to rely on the shooters below deck, which is reinforced between the windows by steel plates. They'll be partially shielded from the spray down there and can fire out of the galley windows.

Daryl, breathing heavily, loads his bow in case the ship is boarded, and watches as Lt. Commander McBride army crawls to the top of the ladder leading below deck to yell a command. Meanwhile, Captain Cummins, who has boldly and stupidly dared to stand up to take aim at one of the approaching boats, gets off two shots before taking several bullets himself. His shoulders jerk right and then left, and his hands slip from his rifle. The rifle clatters to the deck a second before his body does.

[*]

Carol is below deck when the sudden attack happens, and her rifle, longbow, and quiver are with her pack by the card table above deck. Thankfully, Lieutenant Witherspoon shoves a rifle in her hands. She crawls to the nearest window and opens fire on the boats that are speeding toward them, the murky river water kicking up in their wake. It takes her a moment to realize they're solar-powered.

"Cannon!" Lieutenant Commander McBride shouts from above deck. "Fire the cannon!"

There's the clatter of wheels as the cannon is moved to another window and Lieutenant Witherspoon strikes a match. All the men below deck drop their guns and put their fingers in their ears, so Carol does the same. It's not enough to mute the mighty boom, and her ears still ring.

Carol watches through the window as one of the speed boats is blown in half by the iron cannonball. The solar panels shatter, and fragments rain down into the water. Three men's bodies float on the river. The other three men dive below the water's surface to avoid being shot.

Carol seizes her gun again and aims at the second speed boat just as a crossbow bolt pierces the oncoming driver straight through the forehead. That means Daryl is alive above deck – at least for now. The driver slumps face down on the wheel, and the boat turns sideways, exposing three of the pirates to her aim. Carol picks off two, but someone else gets the third. A fourth man runs for the wheel, only to be shot through the neck by one of Daryl's bolts. The last man jumps overboard into the water.

The _Susan Constant_ eases to a stop and jerks back slightly. The ship's been anchored. Carol scours the water through her scope and waits for one of the fleeing pirates to surface. She watches the ripples carefully. It's like playing whack-a-mole. Two misses and then a hit. One miss and then a hit. Two misses and then a hit. One miss and then, "Cease fire!"

Lieutenant Witherspoon is yelling in her ringing air. Carol doesn't know how long he's been yelling, but this time he yanks the rifle from her hands. "Cease fire!"

McBride is yelling it from above deck, too: "Cease fire! Cease fire! Keep the last one alive!"

[*]

When Carol emerges from below deck, Daryl runs to her. They embrace desperately, and then he searches her for wounds.

"I'm fine," she insists. "Was anyone hurt up here?"

"Captain got shot."

They turn and see Thomas trying to staunch the flow of blood from the captain's wounds. Frustrated by the impossibility of the task, he lets go the wad of bloody cloth he's pressing to the captain's chest, checks his pulse, and shakes his head.

Lieutenant Commander McBride salutes the fallen body solemnly. Then he paces the ship, ordering three sailors to jump into the river to retrieve the sole surviving pirate. "Take him alive!" Water splashes as the sailors, knives drawn, vault themselves overboard. McBride shouts to the deputy-medic, "Thomas! Check all for injuries!" He turns to Lieutenant Witherspoon, "Get the two workmen who were assigned to the trade team. Have them check the boat for holes, and see if we're taking on water. Tell them to patch anything that needs patching."

"Yes, sir!" the lieutenant shouts back.

"Gunther!" McBride shouts. "Carolyn! Check the animals in cargo!"

After a struggle in the water, the surviving pirate is hauled on board and bound with rope by his hands and wrists. One of the sailors has been cut in the process, along his arm, and Thomas treats the superficial wound.

McBride walks over to where Daryl stands with Carol. "You have an intimidating reputation," he tells Daryl, "and you look the part. Do you want to help me question the captive?"

Daryl nods.

"I'm good cop," McBride says as they pace toward the captive, "you're bad cop."

[*]

The interrogation reveals no reason for the attack other than greedy plunder. "Just wanted your shit," the captive insists. "We didn't think there were so damn many of you on here! And we sure as hell didn't think you had a _working_ cannon." The prisoner claims his entire camp came out against the _Susan Constant_ , and that there's no one back on land.

McBride paces away with Daryl and lowers his voice. "Do you believe all that?"

"Could be true," Daryl murmurs. "But we gotta verify."

McBride nods. "We want this trade route secured. And we have to come _back_ this way. I hear you can track. Will you lead the search team?"

"Yeah. Want my own team though."

"Name them," McBride says.

"Carol. Raul. Kid's a good shot. Mitch."

"Very well. I'm sending Lieutenant Witherspoon with you, too. And Marcus."

"The fisherman?" Daryl asks skeptically. He'd expect a guard, or anyone better trained to shoot and fight.

"He used to be the skipper of his own crabbing boat. He can pilot you."

McBride orders that the surviving solar power boat – the one that wasn't blown apart - be retrieved. Two of the sailors and Marcus row out to it on a rescue raft. They throw the dead bodies off of it, and Marcus drives it back alongside the _Susan Constant_ , where Raul, Mitch, Daryl, Carol, and Lieutenant Witherspoon – all heavily armed - board it.

As Marcus turns the speed boat toward the distant dock, there's the crack of a gunshot from the _Susan Constant_ , and then the prisoner's dead body rolls overboard into the river, where it sends up a spray of water.

"Guess McBride's done askin' questions," Daryl mutters.

[*]

They approach the dock cautiously, with rifles aimed, because there are boats moored there – two motorboats, a sailboat, and a houseboat. No one opens fire from them, so Marcus purrs to a stop at the dock. "I'll stay with the boat," he tells them, "so we can be ready to pull out quickly if need be."

Daryl nods. He climbs aboard the dock and extends a hand to Carol to help her up. Mitch and the lieutenant flank them, while Raul takes up the rear. The two motorboats are coated in dirt and riddled with bullet holes and look like they haven't been touched since the gas spoiled. There's no one and nothing onboard.

"Looks like we weren't the only ones to think of using this river to get around," Lt. Witherspoon says. "They've attacked and plundered passing people before."

The sailboat looks fresher, like it's been taken out within the last couple of months, but then quickly brought back because it was taking on water through the bullet holes. It, too, is empty.

When they board the houseboat, they split up to sweep the various compartments. Daryl and Carol head below deck, but that requires Carol to shoot a padlock off a door and slide the chains away. Daryl leads the way down. He stops suddenly, turns, and backs Carol up the stairs. "What?" she asks. "What is it?"

"Walkers. I'll take care of it. Stay here." He yanks the door shut, thunders down the stairs, and stabs the walkers quickly through the forehead. The female creatures are stripped naked. They bumble around, gnashing hungrily, with sheets tied around their necks, as if perhaps they hung themselves from the rods in the ceiling, but the sheets eventually slipped loose from the rods after months of kicking. The pirates kept these women locked up down here to visit when they pleased. When the women couldn't take it anymore, and killed themselves and turned, the pirates didn't even bother to slay their walker corpses. They simply shut and locked the door again.

Daryl's hands tighten on his knife, until his knuckles whiten. He throws a blanket over their walker corpses and thunders back up the stairs. Carol is waiting expectantly. "Daryl what – "

"- Took care of it," he says firmly.

"Okay," she says softly, maybe even gratefully, as if she's decided she really doesn't want to know.

Daryl spies Raul coming their way and turns and loosely ties shut the doors with the chain again. He doesn't want Raul going down there either. It might remind him of what he went through back in that church.

"What's downstairs?" Raul asks.

"Nothin'," Daryl replies. "All clear."

Raul takes a step forward. "Anything worth looting?"

Daryl backs him off. "Nah. Nothin'. 'S go."

When they leave the dock and reach land, Daryl sweeps the earth for tracks. He picks up a trail that leads them to a campground. A brown, bullet-riddled sign at its entrance reads: _Powhattan River Park_. "Did we somehow get sidetracked on the wrong river?" Raul asks nervously.

"No," Mitch replies. "That's what the Indians called the James River."

Raul looks relieved. "Oh."

The small campground has bathrooms, a fire pit, grills, platform tents, and just three cabins. They check the tents first, creeping up to them and then circling around them, Daryl and Carol at the front flaps, Raul in back, Mitch on the left side, and Witherspoon on the right. But every time Carol brushes the flaps back with the tip of her rifle and Daryl lunges inside with crossbow poised, there's nothing. Not even bedding.

"'S check that first cabin," Daryl whispers.

The group jogs quietly to the first cabin, where Raul pulls open the unlocked door and the other four sweep inside like a SWAT team. It's completely empty, probably because it's missing half its roof and a fallen tree has landed in the living room. They go to sweep the outside bathrooms next, three in the men's room and two in the women's, and back out of them, pulling their shirts up to their noses.

"Oh God!" Carol groans as she shuts the door of the Women's.

"Think they shit in every toilet and sink till they all overflowed with shit," Daryl mutters. "Fuckin' animals."

Lt. Witherspoon points behind the bathrooms. "It looks like they dug a latrine eventually."

Mitch jogs to the outer edge of the wall surrounding the bathrooms, braces himself with a hand on the red brick, and vomits.

Witherspoon walks over and hands him a handkerchief. "You all right?"

"Fine. The stench just got to me."

When Mitch is cleaned up, they move onto the second cabin. After rapping on the windows and waiting with no response, they kick down the door and sweep inside, spreading out throughout the cabin. They step over piles of dirty clothing, kick aside empty wine and liquor bottles, and crunch over pornography magazines as they clear the living room, kitchen, and bedrooms.

"They didn't even bother to take out their trash," Mitch mutters to Carol, looking around the kitchen, which is scattered with empty cans. "Or do laundry. Or anything."

Carol searches the cupboards. "They have storage food, though. And liquor. We'll come back for it."

"Six bedrolls," Daryl says as he joins them.

The next cabin is similarly a pigsty, and similarly empty of any inhabitants. "There were twelve men on the speed boats," Lt. Witherspoon says after they all gather together in the kitchen. "And twelve bedrolls total. I think the captive was telling the truth. They all came out, and we killed them all." He sighs. "I can't believe we lost the captain."

Mitch puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes. "I know you respected him, James. I'm sorry."

The lieutenant looks down at the hand on his shoulder, and Mitch slides it slowly way. Lt. Witherspoon raises his eyes to Mitch's. "Thank you," he says softly.

"They got shit worth takin'." Daryl picks up a large can of storage food and turns it toward the others.

"Mountain House!" Raul cries. "That stuff has a thirty-year shelf life."

"Got to be at least forty cans and pouches in here," Daryl says.

"There was more in the other cabin," Carol tells him. "In the cupboards."

"I saw guns and ammunition, too," Witherspoon ads. "In one of the bedrooms. And liquor."

"'S dump out their hiking backpacks," Daryl says, "and load up."

[*]

When they return to the speed boat, Daryl's holding a heavy green metal case of ammunition in each hand – about 1,600 rounds of .308 Winchester. The muscles of his arms bugle with the effort. He has a semiautomatic rifle dangling from each shoulder and one across his back, over his crossbow. Raul is pushing a wheelbarrow full of large, Mountain House cans of food, and there's more in the hiking backpack on his back. The lieutenant and Mitch carry milk crates full of liquor bottles and hiking backpacks full of freeze-dried pouches of storage food. Carol, who has her own rifle in her hands in case of trouble, wears a backpack containing an extra, unused battery and a few spare parts for the solar speed boat.

"Holy shit!" Marcus exclaims. "We're going to be over the weight load. We'll need to make two trips."


	132. Chapter 132

Jamestown's lucky the pirates weren't shooting .50 caliber, because that would have caused a lot more damage. As is, many of the .308 bullets remain lodged in the wood, forming plugs. Some did penetrate, however, and the most troublesome holes have been patched by the time the search team finishes unloading the loot.

None of the damage, the workmen report, will cause the ship to take on water. Most of the injuries, Thomas says, are minor – cuts and scrapes from all the hurried running around. There are no deaths aside from Captain Cummins and the ram they brought for trade. Four bullets penetrated the cargo hold where the animals were being kept. Two got lodged in feed bags, but two hit the ram. The smell of roasted mutton now wafts from the kitchen and curls onto the deck.

A brief but solemn ceremony is held for Captain Cummins. The setting sun casts flickering light over the black waters that cover his sunken corpse. When it's done, Lieutenant Witherspoon marches forward, holding the captain's dress hat, which was plucked from his head prior to stabbing him in the brain and wrapping his body in rock-weighted sheets. He extends it to McBride.

McBride takes the hat humbly. "Given the circumstances, and the fact that Commander Lawson declined to join us for this journey, I've no choice but to temporarily assume the role." He places the hat on his own head.

The lieutenant and sailors snap to attention. "Aye, aye, captain!" they all chorus as they salute him.

The newly dubbed Captain McBride salutes them in return and turns to Lieutenant Witherspoon. "I pray to God you're a confident pilot, because I'm not doing a twenty-four-hour shift."

"Captain Cummins taught me to steer this ship well, sir," Witherspoon assures him. "I can relieve you whenever you call upon me to do so."

"Marcus," the new captain calls, "how fast will that solar speed boat travel?"

"The speedometer goes up to eighty, but I'm guessing it can't really safely go that fast," Marcus replies. "I'd say seventy miles per hour, on calm waters, forty when things get choppy."

"Either way, that's a hell of a lot faster than we can go. We'll tow the speed boat for now, through the night. Get yourself a good night's sleep. You'll be skipper of that vessel tomorrow. I want you to drive on ahead with the Dixons so they can make contact with their people before we arrive, and so they'll know to be expecting us. It might be less startling that way than if an English colonial ship rolls up unannounced on their shores."

"Yes, sir," Marcus agrees.

[*]

James Witherspoon steadies the great wheel of the ship as the _Susan Constant_ sails on beneath a canopy of stars. The ship has caught a strong wind and is expected to make up for lost time.

"What a day," Mitch says as he picks up his hand of cards from the barrel they're using as a table. "It was a miracle more people didn't get shot."

"Ain't no miracle," Daryl mutters as he sorts his own hand and shifts into a more comfortable position on his stool. "Bunch of dumbasses. They weren't even aimin'. Just thought they'd outgun us." He tosses in a chip for his starting bid.

"I'll take it as a miracle," Carol tells him as she matches his bid. "A bullet got lodged in a bag of oatmeal. That could have been Sweetheart. I'll thank Garland now for talking me out of bringing her."

"My poor ram." Gunther's chip clatters in the pot. "I was going to trade him and the cock to Hilltop for a horse."

"Poor, _tasty_ ram," Mitch clarifies as he drops his chip.

Gunther raises his tin cup and takes a sip of whisky. Captain McBride declared that everyone onboard could have _a little bevvy to_ _calm the nerves after the excitement_. That emptied three of the looted bottles, and Daryl suspects the crew and passengers will empty another six before the journey home is over. The scavengers themselves split two bottles into flasks for their finder's fees. Several more bottles might end up traded at the fair. Daryl doubts more than five will make it back to Jamestown for distribution at the tavern.

"I thought you quit drinking, Gunther," Carol says.

"I cut back considerably, but I think tonight calls for it." Gunther sets his cup down. "Do you think Oceanside will take that speedboat for one of their horses?"

"I don't know," Carol replies. "They only have the two I sent with my knight Dianne when she led some of the Kingdom refugees there. But they _may_ be willing to part with one. They don't have farm fields. They live off the ocean and their gardens, so they don't have much use for horses except transportation, and they rarely leave their camp. They're homebodies, like you."

Gunther shrugs with his eyes, but he doesn't deny the description.

"Pretty sure Marcus ain't gonna wanna give up that speedboat," Daryl says as he discards three cards and draws three more.

"Well that's not up to him," Gunther insists. "It's up to the council. Marcus says that battery only has a few months left on it, and then the spare _might_ last two years before it goes bad. So unless we can find another, the boat will be useless. But a horse should live another fifteen years. And unlike a boat, you can eat it when it dies."

"Well," Carol smiles, " _some_ of us can."

"I'll try not to make friends with this one." Gunther lays down two cards and draws two, and Daryl wonders what the inside joke is all about. "What do you think of McBride?"

"He seems competent," Carol replies. "He took charge and picked up the pieces quickly. And it's a good idea, sending Daryl and me ahead tomorrow morning."

"I've always liked him better than Commander Lawson." Gunther scratches the salt-and-pepper stubble on his cheek. "McBride was a guest lecturer at the Training Center in Yorktown when it all went down. He'd been a sub-lieutenant in the Royal Navy, so Captain Smith made him a junior lieutenant at Jamestown."

"Explains the accent," Daryl says. The captain sounds Scottish. His I's are ah's and his you's are often ye's. He trills those r's and throws in the occasional word Daryl doesn't understand, like when he asked him how his _wee bairn_ was. It took Daryl a minute to realize he was asking about Sweetheart.

"What do you think of Commander Lawson?" Gunther asks.

"Not much," Carol admits.

"I feel the same," Gunther says. "I'd like to see the council keep McBride as captain permanently. Promote him over Lawson, even though Lawson's technically next in line. McBride proved himself today."

"What about James?" Mitch asks. "Shouldn't the council make him commander? He's proven himself, too."

"The council only appoints the captain," Carol says. "But if the council makes McBride captain – as it has the authority to do - then McBride will have the authority to demote Lawson and promote James, if he so chooses."

"Lawson won't take that well," comes a fifth voice from behind Daryl.

Daryl turns to see Lt. James Witherspoon standing with his hands clasped behind his back and asks, "Who the hell's drivin' the boat?"

"Captain McBride just relieved me," Witherspoon answers. "I'm going down to sleep, but I need to wind down for a few minutes first. Someone deal me in?"

"After this round," Mitch says. "Pull up a chair."

Witherspoon does – a barrel that he wedges between Mitch and Gunther's stools. "Where's Raul?" he asks.

"Sleepin'," Daryl says. "Think ya wore 'em out makin' 'em swab the decks."

"Well, someone had to," Witherspoon says. "Gunther's man doesn't have sea legs."

"I can't be held accountable for the stomachs of my field hands," Gunther insists.

As Daryl folds his hand, Carol asks. "Do you think people are going to blame me for the captain's death? Because I wanted this trip?"

"Hey," Daryl says, "Least we got some damn good loot out of it."

"I'm not sure the loot is going to comfort Ana when she hears that one of the potential fathers of her child is dead," Carol says.

"At least Earl ain't got no more competition," Daryl reasons.

"A man with a faithless wife _always_ has competition." Gunther folds his hand. "Once a cheat, always a cheat."

"Not necessarily," Mitch says. He spreads out his hand – two pairs – Kings and tens. "People can change. They can make amends. They can spend years repairing things. I saw my parents do it, after my dad cheated on my mother. He was genuinely sorry, and he worked at winning her back. They were married fifteen more years after that, until the Great Sickness took them."

"My wife _said_ she was sorry," Gunther replies with a sigh. "And I gave her a second chance, because we had three children. Six years later, she just cheated on me again, with a different man the second time around."

"You were married?" Carol asks as she reveals her flush and takes all the chips.

"Does that surprise you?" Gunther asks.

"Nothing surprises me about anyone's past life anymore," Carol answers, "but you never mentioned a wife."

Mitch takes the cards, shuffles, and deals Witherspoon into the next hand.

"We were married fourteen years total. I got full custody of the children because she wasn't interested in the baggage after she married her new beau. So I alone had the privilege of watching them all die in the Great Sickness."

"Jesus," Daryl mutters.

"I suppose that's why the next woman I fell in love with was a whore. At least she was honest about the relationship and told me upfront what it would cost me." Gunther picks up his newly dealt hand. "But then I went and deluded myself into thinking she might actually love me _back_ , and that we might could get married." He rearranges his hand. "That was a mistake."

"I hope someone comes along some day to make you less cynical about women," Carol says.

"A half dozen someone's already have," Gunther says. "I have the best female friends a man could ask for. The trick, I've _finally_ learned, is never to desire more than friendship with a woman."

Mitch smirks. "Welcome to the club."

Gunther chuckles. "I _wish_ I could swing that way."

"No, you don't," Mitch assures him. "Not everyone is accepting of it. Which is why not everyone feels they can be _open_ about it." He avoids looking at Witherspoon as he says that.

"The truth is," Gunther says, "despite all I went through with my ex-wife and Megan, I've always gotten along with women better than with men. It might be because I had five sisters when I was growing up. But you gentlemen," he slides his hand closed and points from Daryl to Mitch, "you're both quite all right."

"What am I?" Witherspoon asks. "Chopped liver?"

"No, James," Gunther says, "what you are is a coward."

"Excuse me?" the young officer exclaims. "I don't think I've done anything to deserve that label!"

"Of course you have," Gunther replies. "Just kiss Mitch in public one day and see what happens. You might find the world doesn't grind to a stop, that people have much larger things to worry about than other people's love lives."

Witherspoon turns as red as a tomato. "You _told_ him?"

"I didn't tell _anyone_ ," Mitch insists.

"Neither of you is as subtle as you think," Gunther says.

Witherspoon slides his cards together and throws them on the table. "I need to get a few hours sleep. I'm back on the wheel at three in the morning." He jumps down from the barrel he pulled up and heads below deck.

"Thanks a lot," Mitch tells Gunther.

"You're quite welcome."

"Now he's not going to want _anything_ to do with me. Even on the down low."

"I doubt that's true," Gunther says, "but if it is, it's for the best."

"Fuck you, man." Mitch throws down his cards and follows Witherspoon below deck.

Gunther calmly returns his own cards to the deck. "Well, it seems my work here is done. I'm going to go see if I can't roll out a sleeping bag on the port side."


	133. Chapter 133

Daryl lies on his sleeping bag on the floor of the captain's cabin, his arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling. "Are you okay down there, Pookie?" Carol asks from the narrow bunk that hangs from chains a few feet off the floor to allow more storage space beneath. Captain Cummins's black trunk lies beneath the bunk, packed with clothes he'll never wear again.

"Can't sleep."

After what happened today, Carol can't either. She's also too excited about the speedboat trip to Oceanside in the early morning. Once they leave, they'll be there in just a few hours, Marcus thinks, a day or more ahead of the _Susan Constant_. "What are you thinking about?" she asks.

"How come so many people cheat?" he asks.

Carol assumed he'd be thinking about the trip tomorrow, or the fight with the pirates, not about what Mitch said about his father or Gunther said about his ex-wife, or about what Captain Cummins and Ana Carter did together. Carol props her head up on her elbow. "I don't know."

"'S just…seems like a lot of people do it. M'daddy was a cheat, but I thought that was just 'cause he was an asshole. But…dunno. 'S like regular people do it, too."

"Daryl," Carol says gently, "I'm never, _ever_ going to cheat on you."

"Know that."

"Do you?"

"Yeah," he says. "Don't hurt to hear it said, though."

"Come here." She turns sideways and scoots her back all the way against the wall of the cabin so he can climb into the bunk facing her. It's a tight fit, but it's the right fit for the moment. She kisses his forehead. "I want to hear it, too."

"Ain't never, ever gonna cheat on ya." His mouth claims hers, and they kiss for a long time, tongues lashing in a frantic dance, hands tugging on hair, and half clothed bodies rubbing achingly against one another. "Carol," Daryl breathes. "Need – "

"I know." She turns against the wall and slides her pants and panties down. She can hear his buttons popping and the zipper rasping down as she shimmies her panties off her ankles. Daryl bends one of her legs back over his so he can take her from behind, against the wall. He pants heavily into her ear as the metal chains that hold the bunk creak. She groans into the oak, pressing her forehead against the rough wood. He finishes less than ten seconds after she does, spilling hotly into her, and moaning her name.

[*]

When the crowing of the cock in cargo wakes them, they're a tangled mess of limbs. Daryl, startled, flinches and rolls from the bunk and lands with a thud on the ground, his pants still around his knees. He blinks like he's trying to remember how they got there.

Carol laughs.

When they get themselves together, they ease out of the captain's cabin and find McBride coming down the ladder. He turns to face them. He looks tired, eyelids dropping over his light blue eyes. He's piloted the ship through the night. "She's anchored. The sailors will pull the speedboat abreast for you to climb into. Safe travels."

"Thank you, Captain," Carol says.

McBride knocks on the door of the second officer's cabin. "Witherspoon, you're on deck."

The door opens partway, enough for Lt. Witherspoon to stick his head through the opening. "Yes, sir. I'll be up shortly."

When McBride vanishes into the captain's cabin Carol and Daryl have vacated, Witherspoon opens the door all the way and Mitch, buttoning his shirt, comes out. Witherspoon shuts the door behind him.

"I guess you two made up," Carol says with a smile.

"I think maybe Gunther put a burr in his saddle," Mitch replies. "James claims he's not going to hide things anymore, but…" Mitch shrugs. "We'll see. He clearly didn't want the captain to know, but he says that's because he's not supposed to be fraternizing on ship."

Mitch follows them up on deck, where they find Raul at work with the sailors to line up the speedboat under the ladder. "Jack of all trades, that kid," Daryl says.

On their way to climb down into the speedboat, they pass by Gunther, who's stretched out on the deck of the ship in his sleeping bag, his straw hat over his face, snoring. "I bet he had more booze last night," Carol says. "He probably traded Raul tobacco for his scavenger's share."

"So what?" Daryl mutters.

"He was doing so well not drinking."

"Pfft. He was doin' well not drinkin' in front of Madam Linda, maybe. Who cares anyhow? Ain't like it ever fucks 'em up." Daryl's never heard of Gunther brawling while drunk or coming onto a woman plastered. He's never heard of the man being too hungover to do his job. Gunther's never almost gotten someone killed for a drink, like Bob once did in the prison days. In Daryl's mind, there are alcoholics, and then there are drunks. Drunks he can't tolerate, but Gunther's just an alcoholic. "Only one he's hurtin' is himself."

"And the people who care and worry about him. Like Linda and Trisha and Candy."

"'N you?" Daryl asks.

"Yes. And me. I care about my friends."

Daryl nods. "Fine. Then I'll take care of it for you." He kicks Gunther lightly in the ribs.

Gunther snorts awake. He tips his hat off his face and onto his head and sits up to rub his eyes. "What time is it?"

"Time to rise 'n shine," Daryl tells him. "And hand over yer flask. Carol don't want ya drinking no more."

"What?"

"'N fact, get up." Daryl waves his arm. "'S room on the speedboat. Yer comin' with us so we can keep an eye on ya."

"Me? What? You don't want _me_ on that speedboat. I'm not a sailor."

"Neither are we. C'mon."

"I'm not even a very good shot," Gunther insists. "What if we run into trouble?"

"Now that's bullshit," Daryl says. "Ya lived yer who damn life on a farm. 'M sure ya can shoot just fine. Get the fuck up, man. Carol wants her friend on the boat." Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Carol's pleased smile.

Reluctantly, Gunther rises to his feet and rolls up his sleeping bag. "Fine. Just let me grab my rifle and pack."

[*]

The edges of Carol's colonial cloak flutter in the breeze as she climbs down the ladder to board the speedboat. Daryl's strong hands grab her by the hips to help her aboard. They duck their heads beneath the solar panel canopy before sitting in the middle row. Gunther is already at the far end of the bench seat. Carol sits down next to him, and Daryl next to her. They drop their rifles and packs on the floor behind the seat.

Daryl leans forward to look at Gunther over Carol. "Flask," he demands.

Gunther sighs and fishes it out of the deep front pocket of his dark blue jean jacket and slaps it into the palm of Daryl's outstretched hand. "I paid Raul a lot of tobacco for that whisky."

Daryl shakes the stainless steel, eight-ounce flask. "Ain't got but one shot left in it."

Gunther shrugs and rubs his forehead. "I had trouble sleeping last night. That conversation brought up bad memories."

Daryl grunts and slips the flask under his poncho, into the front pocket of his shirt.

Marcus unties the tow ropes. "Hold on," he tells his three passengers as he powers up the speedboat. "It's going to be a choppy ride. I want to see how fast this thing goes."

[*]

Before yesterday, neither Carol nor Daryl had ever been on a speedboat, but they adjusted quickly. This is Gunther's very first time on one, and he grips the seat beneath him with both hands while holding his straw hat tightly between his knees so it doesn't blow away. The wind whips through their hair as the water chops in white waves behind them.

"Having fun yet?" Marcus shouts over the smooth, electric roar of the engine.

"How fast are we going?" Gunther shouts back.

"Eighty!" Marcus calls "The speedometer doesn't lie after all!"

"Feels faster," Gunther mutters. "Is it really necessary to go this fast?"

The boat begins to slow gradually until it's going at a steady, but not choppy, pace.

"Hey!" Daryl shouts to Marcus. "Don't slow down 'cause of the pussy."

"It takes too much energy to go that fast," Marcus explains. "I don't want to risk losing our stored power before we get there. We'll go fifty the rest of the way, give these panels a bit more time to soak up the sun."

Gunther relaxes at the slower speed and takes his hands off the seat. "Pussy, huh?" he asks Daryl.

"Sorry, man. But…ya kind of were bein' one."

"Fair enough," Gunther concedes. "I'm no hero of the mutiny of 7 NE, but I have been known to feed a few hundred people year after year after year. Of course, no one's ever going to put _my_ sketch on a museum wall."

"Sure they will." Daryl's tone is slightly apologetic. "Some day. On the wall with Garland's and all the other mayors of Jamestown."

Gunther laughs. "Me? Mayor of Jamestown?"

"Hell not? Ya work hard. People know ya. They like ya. And yer a manager, right? Hell, mayor's just another kind of manager."

"Hmmm. Never really thought about it before."

Carol reaches over and squeezes Daryl's knee as a subtle thank you for the effort he's making to get along with a friend of hers.

"Ya'd have to quit drinkin', though," Daryl warns him.

"It's not as if I'm the town drunk," Gunther insists.

"No," Carol agrees, "that would be Timmy Two Toes. But you don't want to go down that route, either."

"I do have a lot more clarity and energy when I'm not drinking," Gunther muses. "That's something I've noticed these past couple of months, as I've been cutting back."

Daryl reaches into his pack for one of the freeze-dried Mountain House pouches he took as his finder's fee. "Breakfast?" he asks and turns the pouch toward Carol.

"A freeze-dried ice cream sandwich?" she asks over the low purr of the engine. "How is that even possible?"

Daryl shrugs. "Says thirty-year shelf life."

"Like the ones they made for the astronauts," Gunther says. "But they never actually took them into space. They decided they were too crumbly."

Carol reads the tagline at the top of the pouch: _Savor the adventure_. "I'm game if you are."

Daryl opens the pouch and splits the ice cream sandwich in half and hands her half. Carol takes a tentative bite. It tastes just like the real thing – except not nearly as cold. "Oh my God!" she exclaims and finishes it off happily before licking every last bit of the taste off her fingers. "I haven't had ice cream in years!"

Daryl smiles as he licks the crumbs out from inside his cheeks. He leans right and whispers in her ear, "Got two more in m'pack for later."

Marcus cranes his neck back from where he stands at the wheel. "It's rude not to share."

"Isn't it though?" Gunther asks.

"Watch the road!" Daryl barks, and Marcus turns back around.

Carol laces her arms through one of Daryl's, lays her head on his shoulder, and looks out at the sprawling river that will take her to Henry.


	134. Chapter 134

Marcus teaches Carol to drive the speedboat so he can take a snack break. The ride isn't as smooth as when he's driving, but she doesn't tip it over or crash into anything, and they keep moving in the right direction.

When he takes back the wheel, just thirty miles and less than forty minutes outside of Oceanside, she and Daryl raise two flags above the speedboat – a white flag of peace, and an old flag of the Kingdom, which Carol kept as a memento. That way, Oceanside will know who's coming.

It's not yet noon when they dock on the pier at Oceanside, two nights before the trade fair. The slow-going _Susan Constant_ , which plods on at only about five to eight knots, will arrive tomorrow at about this time, if winds are fair. If winds are poor, it may not roll in until late at night before the fair.

The Kingdom's former knight, Dianne, who is on patrol along the shore, greets them on the pier where the men are crouched and tying the speedboat. She wears her familiar longbow and quiver on her back, but she also holds a harpoon in her right hand. "I see you've settled into life at Oceanside," Carol tells her.

Dianne nods to the boat. "What is that thing? A solar-powered speedboat?"

Marcus stands and smiles at her. "Yes, it is! And it goes up to eighty!" Marcus clamors forward to introduce himself. He eagerly stretches out his hand. "Marcus White, former councilman of Jamestown, manager of fishing."

Dianne smirks. "Dianne Harris, former manager of a Burger King, queen of my own sphere."

Gunther, who has by now strolled over from the speedboat, chuckles while Dianne shakes the fisherman's hand. Then he extends his own. "I'm Gunther Hamilton. Since you're clearly not impressed with titles, I'll just say I'm a farmer."

Dianne shakes. She slides her hand from his grip. "I'll get someone to empty your boat of cargo."

"There's no cargo," Carol tells her. "Just the packs on our backs and our weapons."

"You didn't bring anything to trade?" Dianne asks in surprise.

"Oh, we're bringing _plenty_ to trade," Carol assures her, and as they walk down the pier, she tells the knight about the ship that will be arriving sometime tomorrow.

"Do you use that for fishing?" Marcus asks as he catches up and flanks Dianne. He points to the harpoon.

"And for slaying walkers. And men," Dianne warns him, "when they get out of line."

Marcus smiles uncertainly, walks slower, and falls back with Gunther, who says, "She seems friendly."

Dianne picks up the pace and Carol walks ahead to join her, leaving the men even further back. "Are they all right?" Dianne asks. "Gunther and Marcus?"

"Gunther is a friend," says Carol, which she knows will be sufficient to satisfy Dianne. "He's a councilman. We have nine who run the government. Five of us will be here for the fair. Marcus is…" Carol doesn't know Marcus well. She danced with him once, at the tavern. He kept his hands where they belonged. He's a good fisherman and skipper. "He's fine."

"Well, if you vouch for them, I can put them up in my cabin, on the living room couch and floor. I already promised the spare bedroom to Jerry and his two little boys when they arrive."

"What about Nabila?"

"She's not coming. They sent a letter through the pony express. She had the baby three weeks ago. She doesn't want to travel with an infant."

"The baby?" Carol exclaims. "What baby? I didn't even know she was pregnant!"

"She didn't either at first. Her cycle's too irregular and she's a little…you know." Dianne mimes a belly with the motion of her hands. "But it turns out she was probably at least two months pregnant when we all parted ways."

Carol's sorry she won't get to see the Kingdom's old gardener, but she's glad Nabila was safely delivered despite the journey to the Hilltop after the Kingdom fell. "Boy or a girl?"

"A little girl this time. Nine pounds. Can you imagine?"

"With Jerry?" Carol asks. "Yes."

The men have caught up to them when they reach the tree line. Daryl falls in step on Carol's left while Gunther and Marcus trail just behind them. They've barely disappeared through the trees and entered the clearing where the cabins lodge when Henry comes running toward them. "Mom!"

Carol hands her rifle over to Daryl so her arms are free for embracing her son. Henry drops the fishing spear he holds in his right hand to wrap his arms around her. The teenager is no taller than when she last saw him – he's stopped growing – but he's _much_ more muscular. In fact, he's gone from almost skinny to downright sinewy. It feels like she's hugging a solid rock. She steps back. "Have you been lifting weights?"

"Hauling logs," he says. "I built a one-room cabin for me and Rachel, so she can get out of Cyndie's place and I can get out of Tom's."

"Ya built a cabin?" asks Daryl. "All on yer own?"

"Well," Henry reluctantly admits, "I had help from several of the Kingdom people." Henry says that almost as though he doesn't consider _himself_ to be a Kingdom person, even though he only moved here about a year before Dianne. He picks up his dropped fishing spear, and that's when Carol notices he's wearing waders.

Daryl says what Carol is thinking: "Looks like ya've gone native."

Henry shrugs.

"Like the goatee." Daryl taps his own chin.

"Thanks." Henry strokes the patchy facial hair he's grown since his last visit to the Kingdom. "It's a work in progress." He holds out his hand. "Good to see you, Daryl." After Daryl shakes, Henry asks, "Are you treating my mother well?"

"She wouldn't let me treat 'er any other way."

Henry smiles. "That's for sure."

"Wait a minute," Carol says. "You and Rachel are sharing a cabin?"

"Yeah. We moved in last week."

"You're _living_ together?" Carol asks.

"Mom, we're getting _married_. You _knew_ we were going to. I told you. You saw the engagement ring at your wedding."

"I thought you meant when you were _older_."

"I _am_ older."

"You said when you turned eighteen!"

Henry shrugs. "Rachel turns eighteen in a couple months."

" _You_ don't."

"Look, Mom, we're getting married tomorrow. At the fair. We chose the date because you said you'd be at the fair. And I wanted you there."

"I…Henry, you're so _young_. Don't they have a minimum age for marriage here?"

"Yeah. It's sixteen. Look, there's nothing you can do about it, so I hope you'll come to the wedding and support us."

"Of course I will." Carol tries to mask the reluctance that creeps into her voice. A marriage. A cabin. She doesn't guess there's any chance at all he'll want to move to Jamestown with her now.

"Ya knock 'er up?" Daryl asks.

"Daryl," Carol hisses.

"What?" Daryl asks innocently.

"No, I didn't _knock her up_!" Henry insists. "My father taught me better than that." He nods over Carol's shoulder. "Who are they?" Carol introduces Marcus and Gunther, who have been standing awkwardly behind her, and then Henry jerks his head toward the camp. "Let's get you all settled. How long are you staying?"

As Carol walks alongside him, she explains about the ship that's coming sometime tomorrow. "We'll stay through the fair and for one full day after. Jamestown wants to do some crabbing on the Chesapeake Bay while we're here. Then we head back. We can't stay long because Daryl and I…" She glances at Daryl and smiles. "Well, we adopted a baby girl. You have a little sister. I hope you'll come to Jamestown to see her soon, before it's too icy to use the river. Oceanside has that sailboat." And, if Gunther succeeds in his trade, Oceanside might have the speedboat, too. A trip on that thing would take less than a day.

Henry stops walking. "You adopted a _baby_?"

Carol beams. "Her name's Alexandra, but we call her Sweetheart. I'll show you the sketch when we get settled."

"Well, I need to go fishing, but why don't you and Daryl come to our place for dinner tonight? You can show me then."

" _Come_ to your place?" Carol asks. "We aren't _staying_ at your place?"

"Mom," Henry huffs. "It's tiny. One-room. Open, you know. And…in two nights, it's going to be our _wedding_ night."

[*]

Dianne shows Marcus and Gunther to her cabin while Carol and Daryl are put up in Natania's old bedroom in Cyndie's cabin. Cyndie's only twenty-four, but since her grandmother Natania's death, she's been the _chieftain_ of Oceanside, as the others call her. "When Michonne gets here," Cyndie tells them as they drop their packs on the bed, "I'll just put Judith on the couch and RJ and Michonne can share the bed in Rachel's old room."

"You have a lovely cabin," Carol tells her. It's three rooms surrounding a central living room and kitchen, with a fireplace for cooking.

"It's big for just one person," Cyndie admits, "now that Rachel has moved out. I'm thinking of moving in with Dianne and freeing this up for a couple that's going to have a baby. They just have a one-room cabin right now. Alden and Ivy."

"Alden?" Daryl asks. "That ex-Savior? From the Hilltop?"

"He moved here five months ago."

"Good," Daryl murmurs to Carol. "Then he ain't makin' eyes at Enid no more."

"I'm not sure where we'll put the rest of your people when they come," Cyndie says as she leads them out of the guest room. "Everyone else who has any room at all is going to be hosting people from Hilltop and Alexandria."

"They have tents," Carol tells her. "They'll just pitch them on the shore, if that's all right. Some will probably stay in the cabins on the ship."

"That's fine." Cyndie puts a hand on one hip. "Now…Are these men going to be acting like rowdy sailors? I have a community to think of."

"They've been lectured," Carol assures her. "And I think Captain McBride will keep them in line."

"If not, _I_ will," Cyndie assures her. But as they exit the cabin, she asks, "Any good-looking men under thirty-five on that ship?"

Carol chuckles. "A few."

[*]

Gunther, Marcus, and Dianne join Cyndie and Carol for a tour of the growing Oceanside camp, but Daryl has disappeared somewhere, which doesn't particularly surprise Carol. He probably needs some people-free time after a full day on the crowded ship. She suspects he's gone hunting alone.

"I got your friends settled," Dianne assures Carol.

Gunther and Marcus have not seen a vibrant camp other than their own in over seven years. They look around with great interest, especially at all the single women roaming about. "You've got a bit of gender imbalance here," Gunther tells Dianne.

"It's not a problem," Dianne replies, "Women are quite capable of doing everything men can do."

"Well, not _everything_ ," Marcus says with a grin.

" _Everything_ ," Dianne assures him. "And some things _better_."

"You're not…" Marcus asks. "Are you…?"

"Am I what?" Dianne replies.

"Are _all_ of you …" Marcus glances at Cyndie and then around camp.

"He wants to know if we're all lesbians," Cyndie says. She rolls her eyes toward Marcus. "Have you not noticed the children running around?"

"Oh." Marcus says. As if to emphasize her point, two kids pedal past them on dirt bikes.

"Where are all the younger children?" Gunther asks. "I haven't seen one that looks younger than nine."

"There aren't many," Cyndie explains. "Most were born before the Collapse. The Saviors killed off all our men."

"Who?" Gunther asks.

"Carol can tell you the story sometime," Cyndie replies. "I don't like to talk about it. But you'll see a few toddlers. A couple men have settled here from the Hilltop and Alexandria over the past four years. And now that we have the Kingdom refugees, we're expecting a baby boom this spring."

Cyndie pauses in her walking and points at an open area beyond the cabins. It looks like the trees have been cleared and cut and piled into logs. The logs sit beneath tarps, drying. "In the spring, we're building more cabins in anticipation of our future growth. We'll put the trade tables in that open space for the fair. And we'll do some decorating. But it's not going to be as impressive as the Kingdom's fairs were."

"I appreciate you hosting it," Carol assures her.

"There will be games for the kids," Cyndie continues, "and competitions for the adults, as usual, but no horse racing or jousting or rings this year."

"Not much a fan of horses?" Gunther asks her.

"Horses are fine," Cyndie replies. "We just don't have the room for those kinds of games. The Kingdom had a football stadium."

"I don't see any farm fields," Gunther says as they pass a greenhouse brimming with plants. "So, you hardly need a horse to haul a plow."

"They're good for getting around, though," Dianne says.

"No stables. I don't see any stables," Gunther says. "Where do you keep them?"

"There are stables," Dianne replies. "Original with the campground. They're behind those cabins. You can't see them from here."

"They're a pain to groom aren't they?" Gunther asks. "The horses?"

"Not if you know what you're doing," Dianne assures him.

"But they're expensive to keep fed."

"Not particularly," Dianne replies.

"I can offer you a growler of beer and a sturdy cock."

Dianne stops walking suddenly and drops a hand to the hilt of her knife. "Is that some kind of pathetic come on?"

"What?" Gunther flushes. "Oh, ma'am, no. No. I mean a _cock_. A _rooster_. For your hens. I can hear your chicken coop. I'd offer a rooster and a growler in exchange for one of your horses."

Dianne relaxes her grip on her knife's handle. "We already have a rooster, and we only have two horses. The mare is pregnant and likely to foal in the spring. You're certainly not getting her."

"What about the stallion?" Gunther asks.

"I raised that stallion from a colt," Dianne says.

Gunther looks from Dianne to Cyndie, in hopes of finding her more agreeable. "What about your stallion in exchange for an electric speedboat?"

" _Now_ you're talking," Cyndie says. "What about the cock _and_ the speedboat?"

"Well, I'll have to talk to the council members when the others get here," Gunther says. "Any major trade is going to need the approval of five council members."

After the tour continues another few minutes, Dianne asks, "Jamestown doesn't have horses? I thought Carol said an entire posse came out riding when she first encountered your people?"

"We have nine horses," Gunther admits. "Counting the two from the Kingdom. But three of them are getting on in years, and one is too pregnant to work. And I just lost my very best workhorse to a compound fracture."

"You have nine horses and a foal coming," Dianne says with disbelief, "and you want _my_ horse?"

" _Oceanside's_ horse," Cyndie corrects her. "Remember, that was payment for taking you all in." She looks at Gunther. "We'll talk later."

Dianne shakes her head as they walk on.


	135. Chapter 135

Daryl returns from the forest in the late evening. He holds, upside down by its feet, a large wild turkey. He gives it to Cyndie as a thank you for putting them up for a few days. Cyndie calls over one of the Oceanside women and orders the turkey plucked and butchered and stored in a cooler for roasting on fair day.

"Wash up quickly," Carol tells him. "We're having dinner with Henry and Rachel."

When they enter the young couple's newly built one-room cabin, which is about a hundred square feet smaller than hers and Daryl's, Carol notices the bed in the corner is an unmade mess of blankets and sheets, and there are clothes draped over the back of the couch in the living room. The fireplace needs the ashes swept out, but they've just lit more wood on top of them to cook super. She keeps her mouth shut and resists the urge to pick up the toppled over wading boots she almost trips over when she walks inside.

Rachel Ward is a tough-looking girl, with a bit of an attitude that rubs Carol the wrong way, but at least she's not a doormat. She'll be good for Henry in some ways. She can fish, fight, and sail, and, even though she's only a year older than Henry, she's apparently some kind of leader at Oceanside. Carol heard someone refer to her as "an adviser."

It's a tight fit around the small wooden table, and Rachel is a terrible cook, but Carol compliments the fish stew anyway. She can tell by Daryl's expression, however, that he's equally unimpressed. "You should cook for Rachel more often," Carol tells Henry. She taught him to cook, after all, and she's pretty sure he can do much better than this.

"Henry cooks dinner three nights a week," Rachel tells her. "And I cook three nights a week. We go to the communal dinner on Saturdays. We're going to do everything 50/50 in our marriage."

"Pffffft!" The broth spittles out of Daryl's mouth back onto his spoon.

"Why the laugh?" Henry asks indignantly.

"Ain't nothin' in marriage ever fifty-fifty, kid."

"Maybe not with _you_ ," Henry says, "but I think I'm a bit more enlightened than that."

"Mhmh," Daryl says. "Sure."

"Things are fifty-fifty with us, too," Carol insists. "Just not every _individual_ task. The _big picture_ is fifty-fifty."

"You mean Daryl hunts and you cook," Rachel says.

Carol tries not to grip the spoon _too_ tightly. "Daryl changes diapers."

Henry sits back in his chair and looks skeptically across the table at his mother's husband. "No way."

Rachel chuckles. "I bet that's fun to watch."

"Ya wanna come watch?" Daryl asks her. "I charge admission."

Carol laughs. "You _should_ come watch."

"Yeah." Henry turns to Rachel. "Do you want to go visit Jamestown? Maybe in two or three weeks? Just for a couple days, so we're back before Christmas? Before the river starts to ice over? We could take the sailboat. I'd kind of like to meet my little sister."

"Just us?" Rachel asks. "I mean," she looks across the table at Carol, "I've been teaching Henry to sail, but just the two of us, for that long a trip, that's not going to work. The sailboat would take two or three days. We'd need to sleep and switch out crew."

"You're welcome to bring as many people as you need," Carol says. "And if Oceanside ends up trading for that speedboat, it would only take about eight hours."

"The sailboat can hold eight," Rachel says, "but six would leave room to bring stuff for trade."

"So you want to?" Henry asks.

Rachel shrugs. "It's fine with me. It could be like our honeymoon. Rumor is Jamestown has a _tavern_. They serve dinner and have live music and beer. We could go out to eat! And apparently there's a _movie theater_."

"Where'd you hear all that?" Carol asks.

"Marcus. He hit on me."

"What?" Henry barks.

"I told him I'm not quite eighteen yet, and he backed off and apologized. He thought I was at least twenty-four. Which I totally get." She shrugs. "I'm extremely mature for my age."

Daryl chokes temporarily on his soup – possibly to hide a laugh - and then swallows it down.

"Did you tell him you were about to get _married_?" Henry asks.

"I told you he backed off. He was really embarrassed."

Henry shakes his head with frustration. "Did he _not_ notice the engagement ring?"

"I don't think so. He wasn't exactly looking at my _fingers_."

Henry's spoon clanks against his bowl. "How _old_ is this guy, Mom?"

"I think he's in his early thirties," Carol answers. "Let me know if you have any more trouble with him, Rachel. I'll have a word with him."

"Don't have a word with him," Rachel insists. "He was no trouble. And I can handle myself."

"I'm sure you can," Carol says.

"He just asked me to save a dance for him. It's not like he was lewd."

"What dance?" Henry asks.

"I don't know. He seemed to think there was going to be dancing when the ship arrives."

"Why?"

"I guess because they usually have dancing at parties at Jamestown," Rachel answers. "Marcus says the crew and passengers have guitars and fiddles and washboards."

"Washboards?" Henry asks. "Like…for washing clothes?"

"You can play them I guess," Rachel replies. "And the spoons. He said they play the spoons."

"How do you play the spoons?" Henry asks. "By banging on pots and pans?"

"Nah." Daryl licks his spoon clean and reaches for Henry's. Henry sighs and licks his clean and hands it over. Daryl turns the spoons back to back and plays them against his knee for a couple of seconds before handing Henry's back.

"So you're going to be playing the spoons when the ship arrives?" Henry wipes his spoon clean with his cloth napkin.

"Nah." Daryl dips his spoon in the bowl. "Can't play 'em."

"You just did."

"Not well. And those guys got better spoons."

"Well, sorry my spoons aren't up to snuff." Henry dips his back in the bowl.

They eat silently for awhile as Carol's eyes flit around the cabin. She has a strong urge to hang a painting, or tack up a woven blanket, or put up some curtains, or do anything to make the place look less spartan. There's a rifle, a harpoon, and a fishing spear hung above the fireplace, and their only other wall decoration is a fishing net. Henry's staff leans in a corner. "Are you still practicing your forms?" she asks him.

"Yeah. I do it with a spear now sometimes, too."

"How about your archery?" Carol asks. She doesn't see his quiver and longbow anywhere. Maybe it's under the messy bed.

Henry shrugs. "Oceanside has so many rifles."

"But ammunition is costly," Carol says. "Jamestown has even more rifles, and I still keep up with my longbow practice."

"Mom, I don't waste ammo, okay? I'm happy with my staff and my spear. I never really liked the bow."

"All right," Carol says. "Just thought I'd…"

"- Tell me how to live my life?"

"Oh, cut her some slack!" Rachel insists. "She just wants what's best for you."

Carol's surprised by this unexpected defense from her future daughter-in-law, and she smiles slightly.

The dinner conversation ebbs and flows. Carol tells Henry about all of Sweetheart's firsts. "We brought dessert," she tells them when dinner is done, and she lets them split one of their last two freeze-dried ice cream sandwiches. It's a joy to watch Henry's eyes light up like a little boy's.

Finally, Carol draws out the sketch of Sweetheart.

"She's really cute," Henry says as he passes the drawing over to Rachel. "How old?"

"We don't know her exact birthdate," Carol tells him. "Dwight and Sherry didn't remember exactly when she was born. They'd been wandering with the other couple, trying to survive, when the mother gave birth. We just know she was born sometime in late November or early December."

"So maybe I'll be there for her first birthday party?" Henry asks excitedly.

Carol smiles. "Yeah, let's make her birthday the day you arrive."

[*]

After dinner, Carol helps Rachel to clean up – since it's apparently also Rachel's night to do the dishes, and Henry leads Daryl around to a couple of beach chairs out in back of the cabin. The young man lights the fire pit.

Daryl slumps into one of the beach chairs and fishes out Gunther's flask from his front shirt pocket. "Ever had real whiskey?"

Henry grins. "No." he sits down in the other beach chair and takes the flask Daryl hands over.

"It'll put hair on your chest."

"I've got plenty of hair on my chest." Henry unscrews the cap and takes a tentative sip. He swallows and winces and then covers the back of his mouth with his hand. "It burns."

"'S how ya know 's good."

Henry takes another tentative sip and hands it back. "Thanks. I think that's enough for me."

Daryl smirks, puts the silver neck of the flask in his mouth, and throws back the last of it – about an ounce. He still has his own untouched flask in his backpack, with eight ounces of whisky, and Carol has hers. Daryl screws on the cap and slips the empty flask back into his pocket. "Ya know, yer freakin' out yer mama with this gettin' married thing."

"I know. She'll live."

"Why the rush?"

"It's _not_ a rush. We had our first kiss when I was twelve! We've been dating ever since."

"Kiss on the cheek," Daryl says. "'N ya dated from a distance." They saw each other maybe three times a year until Henry packed up and moved from the Kingdom. Carol said he was chasing Rachel, and he was, but it might have also been his way of dealing with Ezekiel's death. Henry stayed to comfort Carol after it happened, for the first several months, but then maybe he had to be rid of that ghost, haunting every corner of the Kingdom.

"At _first_. But we've been engaged for a year and a half now. And…you know…things being what they are." Henry sways his head back and forth.

"Hell's that mean?"

"She won't risk getting pregnant without being married first. So she won't…you know…" Henry lowers his voice "…have sex without getting married first."

"Yer gettin' married just so you can get laid?"

"Not _just_ ," Henry insists. "I do love her. And…you know. This is the world we live in now. Teenagers aren't kids anymore. I did more by the age of fourteen than most people in the old world did by the age of twenty-five. It just seems weird to _you_ because you didn't grow up in it."

"Ain't weird to me. Just worried 'bout Carol bein' worried."

"Well tell her not to!"

"Pfft. Can't tell that woman anything."

Henry chuckles. "You can't tell Rachel either." He frowns slightly. "I don't think Mom likes her."

Daryl makes a dismissive sound somewhere in his throat. "Two strong women. What're ya gonna do? They ain't never gonna really get along."

"Mom gets along fine with Michonne. And she's a strong woman."

"Yeah but Michonne ain't fuckin' her son."

Henry flushes. "Neither is Rachel. _Yet_. Well…not all the way."

As embarrassed as he looks, Henry's talking, maybe because there's hardly any men at Oceanside to talk to, or maybe because he got comfortable with Daryl during those ten days Carol discarded him at Daryl's temporary camp in the woods. She said she wanted her son to _learn a thing or two from the master_. The kid was only twelve back then, and he was a thorn in Daryl's side at first, but Henry learned quickly, and Daryl almost missed him when he was gone.

He suspects Carol left Henry with him so he'd remember there was a world to go back to. Children to build for. It worked. Two weeks after Carol collected Henry, Daryl pulled up stakes and went to settle at the Hilltop, if you could call it "settling." Hilltop was his home base from that day forward, but he visited the Kingdom and Alexandria and even Oceanside from time to time as a trade representative, and he would disappear on week-long "hunting trips" on occasion, during which he'd take a couple days to continue the search for Rick's body.

"I don't want her to get pregnant," Henry admits. "I don't want to be a father this young. But I want to have sex. I just hope she doesn't get knocked up right away."

"Pull out."

"Does that actually work?" Henry asks.

Daryl shrugs. "If ya actually do it. 'S the doin' it that's tough. Garland's got himself a baby boy 'cause of it."

"Who's Garland?"

"M'best friend." That used to be Rick, in what seems like a lifetime ago now. They all assume he died. Daryl _had_ to, or he couldn't move on. Michonne eventually moved on, too. Last time Daryl visited Alexandria, she was seeing someone. That's probably over by now. No one is ever going to replace Rick. But Michonne needed the fling.

"Father Gabriel says we should try NFP," Henry says.

"N F - what?"

"Natural family planning. The rhythm method. You know, tracking her cycle and abstaining on fertile days. He says it's reliable, _if_ you stick to it. But I guess it's like pulling out. Hard to do in practice. You have to go without sex certain days, and those days also happen to be the days when a woman is naturally at her most horny."

"Gabe? When'd ya see him?"

"He makes ministerial rounds. He's here once every seven weeks. He holds a service, does baptisms and confirmations. Offers counseling. He can't say shit to anyone about anything, so I talked to him about it."

"Ministerial rounds?" Daryl asks. "Man's half blind. How's he get here?"

"Horseback. Another guy comes with him, for defense."

"When'd he start doin' that?" Daryl asks.

"After the last trade fair in the Kingdom," Henry answers. "He met a woman he likes from here. I don't think he's really coming just to _minister_. That's his excuse."

The women come around the back of the cabin now. "What are you boys talking about?" Carol asks.

"Nothin'," they both say at the same time, and Carol smiles.


	136. Chapter 136

Carol can't sleep. She's worried about Henry getting married. She eases out of bed, lights an oil lamp in the living room, slides on her cloak, and goes outside. Cyndie's cabin is directly across from Dianne's. Dianne was sharing it with Beatrice, but Beatrice moved to Alexandria in July to marry Siddiq. The two hit it off at the Kingdom's last fair.

Dianne is behind her cabin, too. She and Gunther sit in brown-and-white lawn chairs and play chess on a small outdoor table. A bonfire flickers in an oil barrel a few feet from them, illuminating the game.

"Couldn't sleep either?" Gunther calls over to Carol.

"No. Too excited about the fair."

"Marcus snores like the dickens," Gunther replies. "That's why we're both up. Poor Dianne could hear it all the way through her door. I'd invite you to join us, but it's a two-person game."

"That's okay. I was just going to look at the stars for a bit." She settles in the long blue-and-white beach chair behind Cyndie's cabin. Carol stretches out her lags, wraps her cloak around herself like a blanket, and looks out through a gap in the trees at the glittering stars in the blue-black sky. She half listens to the murmur of conversation between Gunther and Dianne.

"Did you hand carve this chess set?" Gunther asks. "It's beautiful."

"A carpenter in the Kingdom did," Dianne replies. "I traded him for it at the fair last year."

"Do you think he'll bring more this year? I'd liked to get something personal for Linda. She'd _love_ this."

"He might. Linda? Is that your girlfriend?"

Gunther moves a piece. "She's just a friend."

"She shot you down?" Dianne asks wryly.

Gunther chuckles. "As a matter of fact, vice versa. Though I think I was very gentle about it."

"I heard Jamestown has a serious lack of women. Why would you do that?"

"She's not really my type."

"Why's that? She's a brunette and you prefer blondes?" Dianne's pawn clatters onto a square.

"I prefer ten to fifteen years younger."

"Oh, of course you do. You're one of those." Dianne looks him over as if trying to guess his age. "You're looking for a fertile thirty-one year old."

"Fifteen years younger than _her_. Not than _me_. Though I'm flattered you think I'm only forty-six. And I'm not looking at all. But if I _were_ looking, I'd want a woman my own age, give or take a few years in either direction. Forty-five to fifty-five."

"Ah, good thing I'm safe from your snares." Dianne moves her queen. "I'm only forty-three."

Daryl eases down in the beach chair next to Carol, yawning. "Hell ya doin' up?"

"Couldn't sleep," Carol answers. "That doesn't mean you don't have to."

"Worried 'bout Henry tyin' the knot?"

"Yes," she admits.

"Worse that happens, they get divorced."

"Well that's not very encouraging, Daryl." She talks in a low murmur, so they're conversation isn't as crystal clear to Gunther and Dianne as theirs has been to her. "And it's not the worse that happens. The worse that happens is they have a baby in nine months and _then_ they get divorced."

"Or in seven months," Daryl murmurs.

"She's pregnant? Did Henry tell you that?"

Daryl chuckles. "Nah. Henry says they ain't gone all the way yet."

Carol smacks him in the chest. "Damn you. Don't give me a heart attack like that."

Daryl holds her hand in place against his chest. "Sorry."

"You talked to him?" she asks. "About marriage? You gave him good advice?"

"Oh, yeah, best advice. 'Cause – as ya know – 'm the perfect husband."

Carol smiles. "You really are. Nearly a perfect husband, Pookie."

"Pffft."

"For _me_."

He raises her hand to his lips, kisses it, and then lets it go. He fiddles with the beach chair to push the top back into a half-reclined position and closes his eyes.

"Go back to bed, Pookie."

"Nah, gonna keep ya company 'til yer ready to sleep. 'Cause 'm the perfect husband."

Carol chuckles.

Across the way, Dianne says, "Check," and then, "so tell me about the men on this ship. Any in the thirty to forty-five age range?"

"Forty-five?" Gunther asks. "That's your cut off?"

"Well, I like them virile."

"I see." He sets his playing piece down with a clatter. "Well, Marcus fits your age description."

"No thank you."

"Captain McBride is in his mid-thirties, I think. Jolly sort of fellow, when he's not interrogating pirates. Do you like redheads with Scottish accents?"

"Oooh…I love a man with an accent."

"Is that a fact, ma'am?" Gunther drawls.

"A _foreign_ accent."

"Well, it's foreign to _you_. You sound like you're from the Midwest."

"I grew up in the Maryland suburbs of D.C.," she replies. "I don't have much of an accent."

"You do to _me_." Gunther falls silent and studies the board. "It appears I'm defeated in three moves at most. If I resign, will you play another game? Or do I have to pretend not to see my inevitable defeat if I want your charming company a while longer?"

Dianne chuckles. She lifts the board, and the pieces clatter onto the table. "We'll play again."

[*]

Carol sleeps in late and awakens to a breakfast of baked flounder and eggs. Daryl has disappeared somewhere again. Carol's not particularly concerned about it, though she does ask a sleepy-looking Gunther if he's seen her husband when she finds him at the stables, where he's scratching Dianne's horse behind its ears.

"He went frog gigging with your son," Gunther tells her. "In some creek."

"You know, Dianne's not going to like it if she catches you wooing her horse."

"What sort of woman names her horse Merlin? That's a little concerning, don't you think?"

Carol laughs. "Well, Lancelot and Guinevere were already taken."

"He likes apples. I shared one I packed with him. And now he likes me. Don't you, Merlin?" The horse whinnies and then snorts. Gunther pets the horse and then turns toward Carol. "Dianne really loves her horse. Even if Merlin technically belongs to Oceanside now, he's very much in her heart. I think we need to find a way to trade the Hilltop for a horse instead."

"Fair enough. We'll figure something out. Did you get any sleep last night?"

"A little," Gunther says. "Dianne's kicking the snorer out to a tent tonight."

"I can't really blame her. Where is Marcus now?"

"He talked three women into going crabbing with him on the speedboat."

Dianne crunches over the rocky earth leading to the stable. "Trying to pilfer my horse?"

"No, ma'm," Gunther assures her. "Just making friends."

Carol leaves them to their conversation in the stable and finds Rachel scaling fish outside Oceanside's smoke hut. She asks the young woman if she needs any help with her wedding clothes. Carol expects a gruff dismissal – an irritated _I can handle it_ – but she figures she should at least attempt to extend an olive branch to her future daughter-in-law. To her surprise, Rachel says, "I could use my dress hemmed a little. Otherwise it's probably going to be dragging in the dirt."

Rachel has to get cleaned up and then borrow sewing kit, but soon enough Carol is settled on her couch and at work on the dress - a long-sleeved, ankle-length, red dress with a garish amount of beaded lace around the neck and hemline. "It's very pretty," Carol says, even though she thinks it's tacky and isn't so sure about _red_ for a wedding.

"I haven't worn a dress since I was nine. But Henry wanted me to." Rachel rolls her eyes. "I guess, why not? It's just one day. And it'll make him happy."

"The things we do to make our men happy," Carol agrees as she opens the borrowed sewing kit. "But they do things to make us happy, too, don't they?"

Rachel smiles, and when she does, her face transforms, and Carol can see why Henry thinks her beautiful. "Yeah. Henry's really sweet to me. I guess you and the King raised him well."

"I hope so. I like to think so."

"Do you think you can hem it so it's just below my knees? I'm not really comfortable walking around with a dress around my ankles."

"Sure. Do you want me to put the lace back on? Or we could just leave it off." _Say leave it off,_ Carol thinks. _Say leave it off._ "And I need to measure you."

"Leave it off. It's kind of itchy all the way through the dress."

After Carol measures her, Rachel clears a chair covered in clothes and sits down in it. The dress takes about an hour to hem, and that gives Carol a chance to get to know Rachel a little better. She learns that Rachel is on the "advisory council," along with four other women, including Dianne, who has quickly risen in the ranks of Oceanside. "Cyndie makes the final decisions," Rachel says, "but she consults us first." She also learns that Rachel likes to whittle and that she's made several small wood toys for the children of Oceanside.

"Does Henry need his clothes hemmed or anything?" Carol asks.

"No. His fit fine. And I'm not making _him_ wear a suit. Just khakis and a nice button down shirt. And, well, a blazer. Is that what they called them?"

"Yep."

"Weird name."

Carol is feeling much better about the impending nuptials by the time she leaves the bride-to-be's cabin. She runs into Henry holding an empty bucket. "No luck?" she asks.

"Oh, we caught a bunch. We gave them to Mrs. Abellard to prepare. She grew up in New Orleans. She'll keep her cut, but the rest are lunch. Want to come by in an hour?"

[*]

After lunch, there's a flurry of activity as preparations for the fair begin. Daryl and Gunther help haul cafeteria tables stored in the camp mess hall a half mile from the cabins. The mess hall, which was once the dinning hub for summer campers, has become Oceanside's warehouse.

"Where'd they get all this stuff?" Gunther asks. "I thought they rarely left camp."

"Cargo ship floated up on shore four years ago." Daryl grabs one end of the dolleys full of stacked tables and begins pulling and walking backward. Gunther takes the other end and pushes. "Whole crew was turned, just bumblin' 'round on there. The ship was useless without fuel, but it had some stuff worth keepin' onboard."

"What happened to the ship? I didn't see it out there."

"'S around the east side. This thing's a peninsula. Got three shores. One entrance by land."

They're in the clearing by the cabins later, with one of the tables on its side, kicking down the legs, when Daryl hears the familiar roar of his old motorcycle. He abruptly lets go of the table, and Gunther struggles to steady it. "A little help?" Gunther cries, but Daryl's already strutting toward the sound.

Aaron roars to a stop just before the clearing on Daryl's old bike, with Gracie between his legs. She's wearing a little helmet and holding onto what looks like a saddle horn Aaron's installed on the bike. "Daryl!" Aaron exclaims joyfully as he kills the engine. "Good to see you made it!"

Daryl glances down at Aaron's hand on one of the handlebars. "You like it?" Aaron raises the hand and shows him how he can open and close the plastic prosthetic. "Hey, Gracie, say hi to Uncle Daryl."

"Hi, Uncle Daryl," the little girl says as she slides off the motorcycle. Daryl crouches down and helps her release the strap of her helmet. Gracie yanks it off her head, shoves the helmet in Daryl's hands, and runs off after some older kids.

"Don't I even get a hug?" Daryl yells after her as he stands. She turns around and waves apologetically, and then keeps running. "She even 'member me?" His last visit to the Hilltop was in December – almost a year ago now. It was too cold and icy to make trips in January and February, and the Kingdom collapsed in March. He's been at Jamestown ever since.

"She remembers you." Aaron dismounts the bike and embraces Daryl. He steps back and says. "Gracie wanted to come a day early and play with the kids. I didn't know _I'd_ have a friend to play with, too."

"Found a solar-powered speedboat. Got here earlier 'n we expected."

"You _found_ it?"

Daryl shrugs as he puts Gracie's helmet on the back of the bike. "Men in it attacked us."

"This sounds like quite the story."

"Killed 'em all. Lost one man. The captain. Got a shit ton of loot. The end."

"You aren't much of a storyteller."

"Where's Jesus?"

"Someone has to stay behind to govern," Aaron, Jesus, and Tara have run the Hilltop as triumvirate for the past several years. "And it's my turn to go to the fair."

Daryl runs a hand over the seat of the bike.

"I'll have to bring the bike back on one of the Hilltop's carts and hitch a ride," Aaron says. "They wanted all the ethanol for trade and wouldn't spare me anymore. I'm almost running on fumes as is. I thought I'd have to push it the last half mile."

Daryl slides his hand off the seat. "Listen…uh…'bout the bike…"

Aaron sighs. "You want it back, don't you?"

"Give ya somethin' for it."

Aaron raises an eyebrow.

"Listen, man, if ya don't want to…'s fine. Gave it to ya."

Aaron looks the bike over. "So lay it out. What will you give me?"

"When was the last time ya had an ice cream sandwich?"

In the end, Aaron agrees to trade the bike for Daryl's last ice cream sandwich – which he can't wait to watch Gracie eat – she's _never_ had ice cream in her life – Daryl's 8-ounce flask of whiskey, and a large can of Mountain House biscuits and gravy.

"Ya sure 's all ya want?" Daryl asks.

"Honestly?" Aaron says. "I feel like I got the better end of the bargain. This bike's mostly been a pain in the ass. Fuel's too expensive."

Daryl straddles the bike and grins. He bounces a little on the seat, puts his hands on both the handlebars, and kick starts it. He roars around the camp until the last of the fumes die and he peters to a stop by Gunther, who's just finished setting up a table.

"What sort of miracle is that?" Gunther asks.

"Runs on corn," Daryl says as he dismounts. "Think the council can spare me any to make ethanol?"

"You know how?"

"Yeah, used to do it all the time. Ain't that hard. Just takes patience."

"We use all that corn. Cornmeal. Corn flour. Creamed corn. Corn on the cob. Animal feed."

"Animal's can eat grass."

"They mostly do. We use the dregs of the corn for animal feed. I guess we don't _have_ to. I'll just need to fence in new grazing fields outside of Jamestown eventually, herd them in and out until the grass inside regrows."

"Easy."

"It's not easy," Gunther tells him. "It's work. I'll need another good herding dog."

"A'ight. Talk the council into lettin' me have corn, 'n ya get Dog when I ain't huntin'." With both Gunther and Carol on his side, it shouldn't be too hard to get what he wants.

"I could probably talk the council into giving you the dregs of the corn as long as you turn over sixty percent of the fuel you make for the museum's back-up generator."

"Pffft. _Ten_ percent."

"Fifty."

"Twenty," Daryl counters.

"Forty."

"Thirty. Hell, I'll be the one makin' it."

"I'll plead your case starting at thirty," Gunther agrees. He looks over the motorcycle. "My twin boys used to race dirt bikes. I got them Yamahas for their thirteenth birthday. They took to them like fish to water. So for their fourteenth birthday, I made a track out in back of the farm. I dug it all out with farm equipment – hills, rims, everything. It took almost a year." Gunther shakes his head. "They _loved_ that track."

"Damn, man, wish _I'd_ been yer son."

Gunther smiles.

"Ya ever fix their bikes?"

"I helped them, sure, but pretty soon they knew more than I ever did." Gunther grits his teeth. "All that knowledge…just ate up by the Great Sickness."

"Sorry, man. Sucks."

"We've all lost our share of family, haven't we?" Gunther asks. "Did you have any kids in the old world?"

"Pfft. Me? Nah. Mean…not that I knew of."

Gunther laughs. "You get around?"

"Nah. Not really. Not that much. But…ain't never had a real thing 'fore. 'Fore Carol."

"Well, that's the real thing for sure. You're a lucky man."

"Yeah." Daryl nods. "Fuck yeah. I _am_."

"Since you've been friendly toward me lately, I take it you don't think I'm trying to steal your wife anymore?"

"What?" Daryl exclaims. "Ain't never thought that."

"No?"

Daryl shrugs. "Mean…ain't never thought you'd _succeed_."

Gunther chuckles. "No. I don't suppose I could. Where _is_ your wife?"

"Makin' decorations for the fair. With Henry."

"No teenage boy wants to do arts and crafts. What a good son, to indulge his mother that way."

"Yeah, well, might of told 'em I'd kick his ass if he didn't."

[*]

All the tables are set up and the fairgrounds festively decorated for tomorrow. People's stomachs have begun to growl. Fortunately, Marcus and his speedboat crew have returned with cages full of crabs. Preparations for a communal meal are underway when the sound of boisterous men, hooting and laughing and strumming guitars and plucking fiddles, drifts from the shore.

The crew and passengers of the _Susan Constant_ burst through the trees and spill into the campground, turning about with awe as they survey they scene.

"Hello, ladies!" one of the sailors shouts.

Raul brings up the rear, quietly, a rifle on one shoulder and a pack on the other, looking cautiously and curiously from left to right.

"Simmer down, lads!" Captain McBride booms. "Simmer down! Best behavior! Now who's in charge here?"

Cyndie, shaking her head and smiling ever so slightly, strolls forward to greet her Jamestown guests.


	137. Chapter 137

While the crabs steam in large pots over open fires on the campground, the animals are brought off the ship. The billy goat is stored in Oceanside's former pig pen – which is now free of pigs after a failed attempt to domesticate and breed two wild hogs. The cock is put in the hen house for now, until it can be offered in trade.

"Won't the roosters fight?" Dianne asks Gunther as she helps him open the cage and usher the bird inside. "If there are two in there?"

"It should be fine. Y'all have twenty hens. That's ten to a cock. There's only so much satisfaction a man can take." Dianne rolls her eyes, and Gunther smiles. "They'll establish a pecking order soon enough, but no one should get hurt."

Tents are pitched for the night on the shore, but the men linger in the campgrounds after supper is finished. Captain McBride asks the five Jamestown council members if they can tap one of the kegs they brought for trade, as a thank you to their Oceanside hosts.

Carolyn is the reluctant hold out. "There's 124 pints in each of those kegs! Just think what we could get in exchange for all that beer at the trade fair tomorrow."

"We'll still have two kegs left," McBride reasons. "And we'll _all_ enjoy this one. _Together_. It will smooth the way to a good treaty. Isn't that what the council wants?"

"Then shouldn't we wait until tomorrow to tap it, when representatives of _all_ the communities are here?" Carolyn asks.

"We could tap another tomorrow!" McBride suggests.

"Then we'd only have one for trade!" Carolyn cries.

"We have six full bottles of liquor, too," McBride replies. "The cock, the goat, storage food, corn meal, oatmeal, ammunition – need I go on? And come on now. They just fed us all!"

"With the crabs _our_ fisherman caught," Carolyn reminds him.

"The Oceanside lasses helped him," McBride insists. "Look, I've no authority here, I know. We're not on the ship anymore, but come on now!"

"Oh, fine," Carolyn mutters. "But I get a _full_ pint."

"With 124 pints to a keg, _everyone_ gets a full pint," McBride assures her.

"Except you," Carol warns Gunther with a smile.

A pre-fair party erupts on the campgrounds. Some Jamestown men play music while others ask women to dance, and the musicians switch out from time to time. A few of the Kingdom refugees join in the music making with their own instruments.

Daryl sits on the periphery of the party, lounging on his motionless bike, his arms slung casually over the bars. He talks with Aaron, who stands beside him while keeping an eye on Gracie. The little girl joins a dancing train of older kids.

Lieutenant Witherspoon, being handsome and relatively young, draws his fair share of attention from the women. Mitch sits at a picnic table next to Carol and across from Gunther and Dianne, watching unhappily as the lieutenant dances with one woman after another.

Cyndie and Witherspoon come off the dirt dance floor, breathing from the exercise, and stand smiling before the picnic table. "That was fun," Cyndie admits, looking younger than Carol's ever seen her, the usual solemnness gone from her face. "I haven't danced like that since my freshman Homecoming dance."

Lt. Witherspoon half bows to her. "Glad to be of service."

"I suppose I should ask," Cyndie says. "Do you have a girlfriend back in Jamestown?"

"Uh…no, actually." Witherspoon looks directly at Mitch. "I have a boyfriend. Here."

Cyndie follows his gaze. "Oh."

Mitch lowers his lopsided grin to the table.

"That doesn't mean we can't have fun dancing, though," the lieutenant says. "But…" He glances behind himself. "You know, you should ask Raul." He jerks his thumb in Raul's direction. The young man is sitting alone atop a picnic table, some distance from all the activity, just watching.

"He doesn't look like he wants to be a part of the party," Cyndie observes.

"I think he's just shy," the lieutenant says. "I'm sure he'll say yes if you ask."

"He looks a bit young."

"He's my age," Witherspoon tells her. "Well, four or five years younger, I think. Perfectly legal."

Cyndie laughs. "Well, one dance can't hurt." She heads over to Raul.

Carol scoots to the edge of the bench so Witherspoon can sit down next to Mitch. " _Boyfriend_ , huh?" Mitch asks.

The lieutenant shrugs.

"You aren't afraid the sailors are going to give you flack?" Mitch asks.

"They will, I'm sure." Lt. Witherspoon looks across the table at Gunther. "But the farm boy was right. I should have the balls to take the flack."

"Want to dance then?" Mitch asks him.

"Oh, hell no. I'm not drawing _that much_ flack. Besides, you're a terrible dancer."

Mitch chuckles. "Fair enough."

"How about you?" Gunther asks Dianne.

"How about me what?"

"Would _you_ like to dance?"

"Oh, I don't dance."

Gunther looks across the table. "Carol?"

"Sure, why not." Carol stands and follows Gunther toward the dirt dance floor, pausing for a moment before Daryl's bike. Aaron stops talking to him. "If you don't want me dancing with Gunther," she tells Daryl, "you'll have to cut in."

Daryl shrugs. "Y'all have fun."

"So you're just going to stay here the whole party, sitting on your motorcycle?"

"'S m' plan."

Carol pouts playfully. "I think you love that bike more than me."

"Pffft. Much rather ride you."

Aaron snorts.

"Maybe later," Carol tells him before following Gunther to join the other dancers. They find an open spot between Henry and Rachel and Cyndie and Raul.

As they dance, Carol asks, "How are you liking Oceanside?"

"It's a great place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live here," Gunther answers. "The view is spectacular, the ocean is peaceful, and the cabins are quaint. But there's no crops to speak of. Just the garden and greenhouse. No fruit trees. No animals other than chickens and a couple of horses." He looks over her shoulder where Dianne is still sitting with Mitch and the lieutenant. "And the women are cryptic."

Carol chuckles. "Well, you're good at solving puzzles, aren't you?"

"Not really. I don't have the patience for it."

When the music fades to a stop and the dancers step apart, Henry taps Gunther on the shoulder. "May I have my mother for the next dance?"

Gunther steps back and rolls his hand in a gesture of permission. Meanwhile, Captain McBride asks to dance with Cyndie, and Raul defers to him. The young man is slinking off the dance floor when another Oceanside woman pulls him back.

Gunther looks around for a new partner and finds Dianne has made her way to the floor. "I'll take you up on that dance now," she says.

"Why the change of heart?"

"I watched you with Carol. You're a surprisingly competent dancer."

"Ah. But are _you_?" Gunther takes her by the hand and leads her to a free spot.

The music starts again, and Rachel is swept up by a twenty-something sailor.

"She's engaged!" Henry shouts to him as Rachel allows herself to be twirled off. He returns his attention to Carol and takes one of her hands and puts his other hand just above her hip, in that formal way Ezekiel taught him to dance. "Mom," he assures her as he steps and slides and leads her in a ballroom-style dance, "it's going to be all right. Me and Rachel. Being married."

"I know," she lies.

"You're afraid of us getting married," he says as they continue to dance, "because you're afraid it's going to be with us like it was with you and Dad."

"What do you mean?" She and Ezekiel had an excellent marriage, at least to all public appearances. Surely it must have seemed so to Henry.

"You fell out of love with him," Henry says matter-of-factly. "If you ever really _were_ in love with him. But that's not going to happen with me and Rachel, because I'm not half in love with some old friend of mine."

Carol stops still. "Henry, Daryl and I never - "

Henry forces Carol to move out of the way as Cyndie and Captain McBride dance near. He walks her over to a tree beyond the dance floor. A bonfire flickers nearby in an oil can, painting a pattern of light and shadows on the trunk. "Look, I'm not blaming you for anything," Henry says. "I know you didn't cheat on Dad. But if he had lived, can you say you'd still be married to him today?"

"I…"

"You can't say it. Because you don't know. Daryl wouldn't have broken that up. He'd have kept keeping his distance. But _you_ might have broken it up. Or Dad might have gotten lonely and…you know… _done_ something that would break it up."

"Your father was an honorable man, Henry. He never would have cheated on me."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that. He _was_ an honorable man. But he got lonely sometimes, Mom. Didn't you see it?" Henry's eyes are misty in the firelight. "He once told me the loneliest a man can ever be is when he's with someone, but he's still alone. At the time, I thought he was talking about this character in a book we were reading, but…he wasn't."

The revelation chokes Carol with guilt. "I loved you father, Henry, I did. In my way. It wasn't the same as the way he loved me, but I _did_ love him. And I tried to - "

"- I know you did. I know you tried. All he ever wanted was you. And you gave him as much of yourself as you could manage to give. He had a family until the day he died. That's more than most people get in this world. You gave him that family. You gave _me_ that. That's part of why I left the Kingdom when I did."

"What?" Carol asks.

"Because you were always _giving_ to me. If I hadn't left, you would have kept ordering your life around me. You wouldn't have moved on. You wouldn't have gone on that road trip with Daryl. You wouldn't have found _your_ happiness. And you seem really happy, Mom."

"I am." Carol swipes away a tear beneath her eye.

"I am, too. With Rachel. Okay?"

Carol nods and swipes at another tear. "Okay."

Henry gives a quick hug and draws back. "Now are you going to pull yourself together and get back on this dance floor with me?"

[*]

As the party wears on, Cyndie is forced to announce that it will have to end, because it's way past the children's bedtimes, and the noise is keeping them up. "We also drew three walkers into our camp," she said. "Captain McBride and I have dispensed with them, but it's probably time to quiet down for the night."

"In other words," Captain McBride trills, "pack it up lads. Back to the beach."

The crew and passengers of the _Susan Constant_ scatter, but not all of them alone. Some follow willing women back to their cabins. The rest, dejected, return to their tents along the shore, including Marcus, who has been kicked out of Dianne's cabin for his snoring. "I guess it's just you and me tonight," Gunther says.

"Don't let that give you any ideas," Dianne warns him.

"Too late. I already had an idea that we might crack out that parcheesi set I saw on the shelf under your coffee table."

"God no. I hate parcheesi. That was Beatrice's set. She forgot to take it when she moved to Alexandria. But we can play mancala."

Gunther smiles. "Whatever the lady's pleasure."

"It's a board game," Dianne clarifies. "With stones. It doesn't involve manacles."

"I'm aware," Gunther assures her as he follows her to her cabin. "Strange your mind went there, ma'am."

Cyndie tells Raul he's welcome to stay in her cabin, which makes him smile, until she says, "But I don't think I'll be there tonight. Captain McBride is going to give me a tour of the ship, and I might just crash in Lieutenant Witherspoon's cabin, since he's staying in his boyfriend's tent tonight. I don't want to have to walk all the way back home that late."

"Oh," Raul says quietly. "Umm…You know, he's like…forty, right? Captain McBride."

"He's thirty-five."

"He looks older."

"Not really," Cyndie tells him. "There are extra blankets in my bedroom closet if you need them."

[*]

Raul throws himself onto the couch when they get into Cyndie's cabin as Daryl lights the fireplace and Carol hangs her cloak on the coat rack. "Think I'm just going to sleep on this couch," Raul mutters. "I don't want to mess up the other guest bedroom's sheets. I know your Alexandria friend is sleeping there tomorrow."

"Michonne," Carol tells him. "She has two children. Judith and RJ."

"I guess I better pitch a tent tomorrow then. One of them will need this couch."

"Nah." Daryl stands from his crouched position before the fireplace, now that the flames have caught. "RJ can sleep in the bed with 'er. Judith on the floor."

Before Carol retreats to the bedroom, she whispers in Daryl's ear, "Stay up with him for a while. You can take me for that ride in the morning."

Daryl nods and watches her retreat. He slides into a wicker chair with an indented circular cushion, his back to the fireplace. "Hell kind of chair is this?"

"They call it a papasan," Raul says. He shrugs out of his leather jacket and then fishes his flask out of the pocket. "But that might be a mamasan, because it's smaller."

"They got babysans?" Daryl quips.

"Actually, yes, I think they do. For little kids." Raul unscrews the top of the flask.

"Don't drink that whole damn thing. You might meet a girl tomorrow night, want to share."

"I met _three_ girls tonight." Raul takes a swig. "Danced with all three. But they _all_ picked other guys."

"Not _all_ of 'em. That one woman went home alone."

"Thanks. Thanks for reminding me I'm worse than nothing."

"Nah. She just ain't interested in a one-night stand." And that's about all any of this is, Daryl thinks. Three nights at most. They'll be pulling up anchor soon. And Daryl's glad of it. As great as it was to see Aaron today, and as anxious as he is to see other old friends tomorrow, he misses Sweetheart. He misses her silly laugh, the way she claps her hands, her awkward hugs. He misses his own bed, too, and his cabin. He misses his godchildren and he even misses the hustle and bustle of the Jamestown. He misses it all a lot more than he expected to. Maybe his days of roaming are over.

"Cyndie's _not_ sleeping in that empty officer's cabin." Raul takes another swig. "She's sleeping with Captain McBride. Why him? What's he got that I don't have? I mean, other than an entire ship and crew under his command." He sips again.

"Give me a swig." Daryl gestures with his hand, and Raul hands over the flask. The cap is attached by a loop, so Daryl screws it back on without sipping and slips it into his front shirt pocket. He taps it. "Give it back to ya in the mornin'."

Raul sighs. "Fine. I won't drink anymore. I'll save it and add it to my stash." He yanks off his boots and lies back on the couch with an arm over his eyes. "I might be the richest man in the biggest town in the known world. And I still can't get a girl to pick me."

That's the last thing Daryl hears out him for the night. Raul dozes off on the couch, and Daryl makes his way to bed, where Carol curls back against him, warm and familiar.


	138. Chapter 138

The Alexandria contingent is the first to arrive in the morning. Michonne rides a sleek black stallion that drags a small cart full of goods for trade. RJ sits between her legs on the horse, while Judith rides on the back of the cart, her legs dangling off it. Daryl and Carol come out to greet them.

Judith's grown at least three inches since Daryl last saw her. She runs to him and he lifts her up in a twirl before setting her on her feet. "Love them boots."

"They're snakeskin!" Judith says as she shows them off, lifting one leg high and then stomping her steel-tipped heel back on the ground. "Mommy's ex-boyfriend made them." She turns around to reveal the sheath on her back. "Do you like my katana?"

"When'd ya get that?"

"For my eighth birthday."

"I've started teaching her forms," Michonne says as she strolls up to them with RJ by her side. The horse is offered a pan of water by an Oceanside woman, who begins to unbridle it and wipe it down. "She's doing really well with them." Michonne hugs Daryl and then Carol. "So, how's married life?" She asks the question with a grin that doesn't leave her face. It's clear she still can't believe Daryl's a married man.

"'S good," Daryl says.

"We adopted a baby." Carol eagerly tells Michonne about Sweetheart and promises to show her the sketch later. Then she crouches down to say hello to RJ. "You've gotten so big since our wedding!"

RJ grabs his mother around the leg and buries his face against her hip.

"Sorry, he's still shy," Michonne says. "But he'll warm up by the afternoon."

Daryl waves to the kid, which causes him to slide all the way behind Michonne's back. He can't believe that kid is Rick's. Or Michonne's. RJ just doesn't have the backbone. Maybe he'll grow one in time. The world hasn't forced the boy to step up yet. He was born after the last great battle, after the defeat of the Saviors. There's been peace ever since. Not always _plenty_ , but at least peace. Other than trips to the annual trade fair, RJ has never left the gates of Alexandria. Michonne has to toughen that boy up, Daryl thinks. She coddles him, because he's all she has left of Rick.

Judith is fierce, however. She's just drawn her little katana and is growling as she shows off her forms.

"Judith," Michonne calls. "Why don't you take your brother and go play with the other kids?"

Judith sighs like it's an imposition to be expected to play with children. She sheaths her katana and takes RJ by the hand and leads him off.

A two-horse cart rolls into the campground now. Rosita drives it, with Eugene and Father Gabriel on the long bench seat beside her. Several more Alexandrians sit on the edge of the cart, their backs against a row of crates. They jump off when Rosita eases the cart to a stop and scatter to talk to Oceanside friends. But Rosita, Eugene, and Father Gabriel make their way over to Daryl and Carol. Hugs are exchanged all around.

"Siddiq couldn't make it," Father Gabriel says, looking straight at Carol with his non-cloudy eye. "He asked me to convey his regrets and say hello to you both." He turns the good eye to Daryl. "But there's a high-risk pregnancy back at Alexandria, and she could deliver any day now. He might be needed."

"We're sorry we missed him," Carol says. "Have the Kingdom people settled well?"

"More than settled," Father Gabriel assures her.

"Your knight William is on our council now," Michonne says. "He sends his regrets, but we needed to leave at least three council members in charge. He and Laura and Kyle are running things in our absence."

"You have a _seven-_ member council now?" Carol asks. "Or is one of you off it?" She looks from Michonne and Rosita to Father Gabriel and Eugene.

"We've grown with the Kingdom refugees," Michonne says. "Every house is full now. So we expanded the council to seven."

"Carol's on the Jamestown council," Daryl says proudly.

Michonne flashes an open-mouthed smile. "I'm not at all surprised."

They talk for a while, and it seems Alexandria has faired well, with some minor hiccups. They had a power outage for the entire month of August, and they lost hot water for all of October and had to boil the cold, but their engineers got things up and running again both times.

"Y'all're spoiled," Daryl says. "We ain't got no power or runnin' water outside the museum."

"Were I immersed in your particular scenario," Eugene says, "and I had my druthers, I would henceforth be locating my abode in that museum."

"It's not very homey," Carol tells him. "But there have been two offices made into bedrooms. And there's an orphanage in the largest open area. And in the laundry room," she stops suddenly and glances at Daryl.

"We found Dwight," he says.

"Dwight?" Rosita asks in shock.

"What's this about Dwight?" comes Tara's voice from behind them.

Daryl turns to find her dismounting a brown mare. She strolls up to the group cautiously. "You _found_ him? He's alive?"

"Him and Sherry both," Daryl says. "I ran into 'em when I was – well, 's a long story. They're at Jamestown."

Tara shakes her head. "You took him in?"

"Jamestown did," Carol tells her. "It was the council's decision. They've integrated well."

"Unbelievable," Tara mutters.

"All that was years ago," Michonne says. "The Saviors have changed. And the ones who wouldn't? They're gone. Laura is even on the Alexandrian council now."

"I know," Tara says. "And Alden was a help at the Hilltop before he moved here for Ivy. Even Oceanside was willing to take him in. But we're talking about Dwight. He killed my girlfriend."

"And we killed our fair share of Saviors," Father Gabriel says gently. "It's past time to move on."

"I _had_ moved on," Tara mutters. "Before I knew where he was." She looks at Daryl. "Don't ever bring him to one of these fairs. Promise me that."

"Promise," Daryl says.

"It's good to see you." Tara steps forward and hugs him and then Carol.

There's the creaking of wheels as a well-packed Hilltop cart eases to a stop. Eduardo, one of the Hilltop guards, is driving. Enid and Hershel slide off the back while Eduardo is greeted by an Oceanside woman. Together, they begin to strip the horse of its saddle.

"Uncle Daryl!" Hershel cries and runs to him.

Daryl scoops him up into a bear hug, murmurs, "Missed ya, mini-Glenn," and sets him on his feet.

"Toss a ball with me later?"

"Ya bet." Daryl ruffles his hair.

Hershel looks up at Enid and asks if he can go play with the other kids. She waves him off. "I don't know how I got to be the mama," she says. "I'm only twenty-two."

"Hey, I've tried to step up," Tara says. "He just prefers you."

"Well, good thing he has two uncles at the Hilltop." Enid tilts her head at Daryl. "Especially now that his third uncle is gone. I've missed you." She steps forward and hugs him, and then she hugs Carol.

There's a lot of talking and catching up, and surprise over the fact that Daryl and Carol have an adopted baby girl. "Hey." Daryl nods to Michonne. "Yer _ex_ -boyfriend made Judith them boots?"

Michonne shrugs. "Darius and I broke up."

"Why?" Tara asks.

"He wanted me to move in with me. It was too much."

Daryl's not surprised. Michonne's not ever going to let anyone step into Rick's shoes, but she'll have her fun from time to time to blow off steam and feel alive.

"I'm currently sans partner myself," Eugene announces.

"Yeah, but that's not really a _change_ ," Rosita tells him.

Eugene glances behind himself at Father Gabriel, who has wandered off to talk with the Oceanside woman Henry said he's been gradually wooing during his ministerial rounds. "But a change may be forthcoming." Eugene turns forward again. "Romance is always in the air at the annual fair. That's King Ezekiel's legacy. I just have to ascertain the 4-1-1 on all the single ladies who will be in attendance."

"Enough of Eugene's love life." Rosita smirks at Enid. "How's yours?"

"I'm too busy for a love life," Enid assures her. "I'm tending to my patients, training an apprentice, and half-raising Hershel."

They're talk is interrupted by four Jamestown sailors who are eager to introduce themselves to the women. After they try to flirt with Michonne, Enid, Tara, and Rosita for a few minutes, Michonne tells them to fuck off, more with her body language and eyes than with her words, and the sailors soon enough do.

"What did you do that for?" Rosita asks. "That guy with the New Jersey accent was _hot_." She turns and wanders off after the sailors.

"Did you finish that second windmill at the Hilltop?" Carol asks Tara.

"We did," she replies. "We have a power in the infirmary now, at least half the time."

Raul approaches the group. Enid rolls her eyes toward him and says, "Not interested."

"Uh…interested in what?" Raul asks.

"You came over here to hit on us, like those sailors."

"Uh…no. I came over to ask if I could help any of you set up at your booths. I don't have anything to do."

"Sorry," Enid apologizes. "I thought you were one of them."

"Oh. No. I mean, I'm from Jamestown, too. Well, not _from_ Jamestown. I'm a citizen now. Of Jamestown. I wasn't. Before. But I am. Now. I'm just…I'm not a sailor," Raul stutters. "I'm an apothecary. And I do other stuff. I work in the farm fields sometimes. Build. Other…stuff."

Enid smiles at his embarrassment. "I'm Enid." She holds out her hand.

"Raul." He shakes her hand.

"I'm the Hilltop's doctor."

"You're young for a doctor," Raul says. "You don't look much older than me."

"Let's just say I learned of necessity," Enid says, "on the battlefield. We don't have an apothecary, so I've been trying to learn as much as I can about the medicinal properties of herbs, too. Did you bring any books you can trade on the subject?"

"No. Sorry. It's just all in my head. I was trained at my old camp in Williamsburg by this old Cherokee man who'd been doing it forever. But I'll try to answer any questions you might have. If I can help, I want to."

"I appreciate that." Enid jerks her head toward the cart. "And I could use some help setting up Hilltop's booths, if you don't mind."

Raul follows her to the cart.

"Where are Jerry and the boys?" Carol asks Tara.

Tara looks behind herself at the Hilltop cart Enid and Raul are beginning to unload. "He was just behind us, with another cart and a few more people." She takes a nervous step forward in the direction of where the peninsula hits the mainland, and just as she does, Jerry's cry of "Hi-ya" can be heard, and a one-horse cart rumbles onto the scene. "My queen!" Jerry cries as he yanks on the reins of the horse and it whinnies to a stop. He thunders down from the driver's seat, lumbers over, and picks Carol up in his embrace.

"Whoa!" Carol says. "Down please."

Jerry's grinning when he sets her on her feet, and Carol can't help but grin too. "You made it!" he exclaims. "I have news. Nabila had – "

"- A baby. I know. Cyndie told me."

Jerry frowns. "I wanted to be the one to tell you!"

"Well…" Carol says gently, "I don't know her _name_."

Jerry stands up straighter, his chest puffed out in pride. "It's Jeri."

"Ya shittin' us?" Daryl asks.

"Jeri. Not Jerry. J-e-r-i. Like, short for Geraldine."

"So her name's Geraldine?" Tara asks.

"No, it's just Jeri. But Jeri could be short for Geraldine. If that was her name."

"But it's not," Michonne says.

"No. It's not."

Michonne laughs.

"Well, congratulations," Carol tells him. "I'm sure Jeri's beautiful."

By now, Jerry's four- and five-year-old boys have run to his side, and Carol crouches down to hug them. "Wow, they've gotten big!"

"Can we play, daddy?" the older one asks when Carol stands. "Can we go play with them?" They point to where RJ, Judith, and Hershel are involved in some kind of ring toss game with two older kids from Oceanside.

"Go on!" he tells them. He looks around. "Where's Dianne? We're supposed to be staying at her place."

"You know, I haven't seen her all morning," Carol observes. "Or Gunther for that matter either."

"Who's Gunther?" Jerry asks.

"Let's go see if she's home," Carol tells him. "I'll help you carry your packs."

[*]

When Carol knocks on the door of Dianne's cabin, there's no answer. She waits a minute and tries again, and then there's Dianne's voice, calling, "Just a minute!"

More than a minute passes. The door flings open. Dianne looks like she's hastily dressed. "You're here already?" she asks Jerry. Her hair isn't up the way it usually is. It's down, and it looks almost a shade lighter when it isn't pinned up – a kind of golden brown. The left side falls forward in gentle, natural waves over her shoulder and curls above her chest.

"Well, the fair opens in a little over an hour," Jerry reasons. "And none of us wanted to miss anything. So we left before sunrise."

"What time is it now?" Dianne asks.

"Almost eleven."

"Oh. I didn't realize it had gotten that late. Come on in. I'll get you settled."

When they walk in and drop Jerry's things in the living room, Gunther is standing near the fireplace, smoothing back his unruly black hair. "Good morning, Carol. Did all your friends arrive safely?"

"Yes. They're all here. The ones who could come, anyway."

"This is Gunther," Dianne tells a very curious looking Jerry. "He's from Jamestown. He's one of the council members, and the assistant farm manager there. He's staying in my cabin until they all head back. You and the boys can have Beatrice's old room."

"Cool," Jerry says, and steps forward with an outstretched hand. "Jerry."

"Gunther." Gunther shakes his hand and steps back.

"Your barn door's open," Jerry tells him.

Gunther looks down and then, flushing, zips up his pants. "So," he asks a little loudly, "what's the agenda for today, Carol?"

"Well, right now I'm going to my son's wedding. Then the fair opens. There will be booths and games, and you can just wander and have fun and make individual trades from your own possessions. I'm sure Dianne will show you the ropes."

"Mhmhm," Dianne agrees.

"Then in the early evening," Carol says, "the leadership of the communities will meet to discuss the larger, communal trades. And we'll draw up a treaty so Jamestown can enter the Alliance."

Gunther nods. "Sounds like a plan."

As they all head out of the cabin door for the wedding, Carol falls behind with Gunther and whispers, "I guess you solved the puzzle."

"I have no idea what you mean," Gunther tells her. He reaches into the front pocket of his thick, plaid shirt and pulls out a handkerchief. "But I think you're going to need this for the wedding."

Carol takes the offered handkerchief and slides it into a pocket she's sewn inside her colonial cloak.

[*]

Henry's navy blue blazer is a size too big. If Carol had known, she would have taken it in for him. Still, he looks handsome standing under the arch of flowers they wove together yesterday. All of the wedding guests stand for the ceremony, forming an aisle of dirt between them. The Kingdom refugees play the wedding march on flute and violin, and Rachel looks surprisingly nervous as she makes her way down, wearing an incongruous pair of dark brown hiking boots beneath her red dress. She comes to a stop before Henry and turns to face him. Father Gabriel opens his Bible. "Dearly beloved," he intones…

The words fade for Carol as a rollercoaster of contradictory emotions ride up and down her stomach and chest. Just when she feels like she can't stand anymore, Daryl slips a strong, steady arm around her waist and draws her against his firm side.

"…You may kiss your bride."

When Henry pulls apart from Rachel after the kiss, and they turn to face the congregation, Father Gabriel says, "I now present to you, Mr. and Mrs. Walker." Henry's taken Ezekiel's last name, it seems, and given it to Rachel.

Henry clasps Rachel's hand, and they walk down they aisle, heads ducked, beneath a shower of soapy bubbles blown by children.

Carol fishes out Gunther's handkerchief and wets it with her happy tears.


	139. Chapter 139

Daryl spends the first hour of the fair taking Judith and Hershel and RJ around to play the kids' games. There's horseshoe, ring toss, cornhole, bean bag ladder toss, and two huge water buckets with squirt guns floating on the surface. They're supposed to use the guns to shoot water at little metal targets that, if hit, will swing out and send matchbox cars careening down a wooden ramp, but, predictably, they just use them on each other.

The only thing Daryl refuses to play is badminton. "Ain't no way a man can look dignified doin' that," he tells Judith. "But I'll watch." So Judith plays one-on-two against both younger boys. Hershel manages to earn one point for every two Judith scores, but RJ misses half the times he swings and fails to get the birdie over the net the other half. Judith slams one over hard, and the birdie smacks RJ in the eye, which causes him to burst out crying. Judith mutters "Jesus Christ" beneath her breath.

"Hey," Daryl tells her. "Language."

She puts one hand on her little hip and leans on her racket. "Where do you think I got it from, Uncle Daryl?"

"Probably yer mama."

Carol meanwhile goes from booth to booth to examine the individual wares – fresh fruits and vegetables, plant cuttings, seeds, jerky, homemade wine, bathtub gin, tobacco, handcrafted weapons, knitted clothing, and more. She trades one of her Mountain House snack pouches (beef stroganoff) for a tiny pair of mittens and a matching hat for Sweetheart. Next she stops at a booth of handmade, wooden games, where Gunther is haggling with the Kingdom's former carpenter over a chess set. They finally settle on a price in ammunition and tobacco, and Gunther mutters he's being robbed while he unzips his pack and shoves the foldable wooden box inside.

As he's jerking up the zipper again, Carol asks, "What happened to Dianne?"

"I think she's looking at arrows." Gunther swings his pack onto his back.

"So…" Carol asks as they walk together toward the next booth, "did you have a good night last night?"

"Yes, I won mancala three out of five times."

Carol chuckles. "I'm not getting any intel, am I?"

"We stayed up late playing games and talking," he replies. "It was nice."

Carol raises her eyebrow skeptically.

Gunther smiles. "We may have had an even more pleasant morning."

"So much for never seeking more than friendship with a woman," Carol teases.

"I didn't _seek_ it. It just sort of…tackled me from behind. And I'm not getting my hopes up." Gunther falls silent because Dianne is strolling toward them.

Dianne shows him her new arrows. "I'm going to enter the archery competition. What are you going to compete in?"

"There are competitions?"

"You should try the axe throwing." Dianne looks him up and down. "You're sturdy."

"I can chop wood. I've never had much cause for _throwing_ an axe."

"Everyone knows Jerry's going to win that anyway," Carol says.

"What are you competing in?" Dianne asks Carol.

"I thought I'd try my hand at the archery, even though I know you'll beat me."

"Is Daryl going to compete?"

"No. Not unless they allow crossbows this year." Carol lowers her voice to a confidential whisper. "The truth is, he's not that great with a longbow."

Dianne chuckles. She considers Gunther again. "You could compete in the wrestling."

"Oh, no. That sounds like a bunch of grappling and grunting and getting sweaty."

Dianne shrugs. "You didn't seem to mind that this morning."

Gunther flushes a pinkish-red.

"There's the spear toss," Dianne says. "Staff. Fencing. Sack races."

"I think I'll just watch you compete," Gunther says.

"Well I'm headed to the food booth," Carol tells them. "My stomach's growling."

"That sounds good." Dianne falls in step beside her and Gunther trails after them.

Everything at the food both is free but parceled out in restricted quantities. Captain McBride is manning the booth at the moment, and he tells them to "grab a plate." Plastic plates are stacked upside down in a stainless steel cart rolled from the old camp mess hall. Carol slides one out and asks, "How'd you get stuck doing this, Captain?"

"Cyndie asked me to. I thought it was to my advantage to agree."

Each community has provided something. The baked apples are from the Hilltop, and the captain parcels out two slices per person on the plates. Alexandria made the oatmeal cookies, and they're each allowed one. The smoked bass is from Oceanside, and Captain McBride uses a pair of tongs to serve that. There are also roasted pumpkin seeds, about a handful each, supplied by both the Hilltop and Alexandria. "And, of course, our coveted Jamestown brew," McBride says. Carolyn agreed to the contribution of the second keg when she learned each community was supplying something to the food booth. "Grab a pint glass and serve yourself, but only two-thirds full, to make sure everyone gets some. Then we'll see what's left."

"I'm laying off the juice for a while," Gunther says, "so I'll give my share to Carol and Dianne. Let them draw a whole pint each."

The women thank him, and Gunther offers to hold Dianne's plate so she can fill her glass. Meanwhile, Carol asks Captain McBride, "Are you stuck here all afternoon?"

"No. Cyndie tells me the food booth closes before the competitions and then re-opens later in the evening for dinner. But she has someone else working the evening shift."

Carol, Gunther, and Dianne find a picnic table in the shade. It's not warm – it's only 59 degrees – but it's bright and sunny. Carol has just taken a bite of her fish when Daryl slides onto the bench next to her and snags a baked apple and sucks it into his mouth. "Hey! Get your own!" she scolds him. "Don't steal mine."

"Sorry. Let ya taste it." He wraps an arm around her waist. His hand firm against her hip, he slides her across the bench until she bumps his hip, and then he kisses her. Daryl doesn't usually kiss her in public, and so there's something oddly thrilling about it. He plunges his tongue in her mouth just long enough for her to taste bitter and sweet. Carol thinks he's probably already had his Jamestown brew without having eaten anything all day. The two-thirds a pint has gone to his head.

"Well, you're in a good mood," Carol says with a smile when he slides away.

"Mhmhm. Won at cornhole."

"Against an eight-year-old and a couple of five-year-olds?" she asks with a smirk.

"Hey, they're damn good at that game!"

"You better go get yourself some food, Pookie."

"Will in a bit."

Enid and Raul join them at the far end of the picnic table now and sit across from each other, each with a plate of food. Enid nibbles on a baked apple and then asks Raul, "Are you going to do any of the competitions?"

"Is there a firearms match?"

"God no!" Enid exclaims in surprise. "We wouldn't waste bullets like that."

"Jamestown rations a few rounds each week for practice," Raul tells her. "If you want to practice. You can store it up, too. Or trade it. We have a lot of ammo. And we reload it."

"Well, we're not having firearms. But you might do well in the 500-yard dash. You look like you can run."

"I _have_ done a lot of running," Raul agrees. "Mostly to escape things." He shrugs. "I might give it a try. Are you racing?"

"Yeah. How about the winner cooks dinner tomorrow night?"

"So you're staying another night?" Raul asks hopefully.

"The horses need the rest," Enid tells him. "We're leaving the same morning you do."

He smiles. "Okay. It's a bet." Raul turns to Daryl. "Oh, by the way, I'm not staying on Cyndie's couch tonight. Can you tell her? Evelyn said I could have the couch in her cabin."

"Is that where you and Hershel are staying, Enid?" Carol asks. "Evelyn's cabin?"

Enid nods. "Yes, in her spare room. Raul traded for one of Robert's games, so the three of us might play backgammon tonight." She looks across the table at Raul expectantly.

"Yeah, that would be fun."

"Although…" says Enid, tilting her head toward Daryl. "Hershel really wants a sleep over with his Uncle Daryl."

"He wanna camp out?" Daryl asks. "Could pitch the tent Raul ain't usin'. Then we wouldn't keep Carol awake."

"I'm sure he'd love that," Enid says.

"Are you doing any competitions, Daryl?" Gunther asks.

"'M doin' the three-legged sack race with Judith."

Carol laughs. "Oh, I can't _wait_ to see that." The rule is that the teams have to consists of one adult and one child under twelve.

"Hershel wants to do that," Enid says with a sigh and a shake of her head. "It's really not my thing."

"I could do it with him," Raul offers. "If you want me to."

[*]

An hour later, after Daryl has eaten and his eyes aren't twinkling any longer, a line of yellow police tape is stretched from tree to tree as the kids and adults slide one leg each into a burlap sack. Cyndie blows a whistle, and they're off to a hopping start. Spectators line the earthen aisle between cabins that forms the racetrack to cheer on their favorites. Carol watches from the other side of the yellow finish line, chanting, "Go Judith! Go Daryl!" while, beside her, Enid cheers for Raul and Hershel.

It's neck and neck between the seven pairs for a while, but then Jerry and his five-year-old son take a stumble and face-plant, laughing, on the ground. RJ stops a moment to look with worry at the fallen pair, which causes him and Michonne to fall behind. Judith and Daryl pull ahead of the three Oceanside women and their kids, but then Hershel and Raul pick up the pace and overcome them, hopping across the finish line first and breaking the tape.

The latter pair hops across the finish line first, breaking the tape.

"Uncle Daryl!" Judith complains when they hop over the fallen tape a few paces behind. "You're too _slow_."

"We got second!" he tells her.

"Second place is for losers!"

Daryl shakes his head and shrugs out of the sack.

Hershel jumps up and down shouting, "We won! We won! I beat Judith at something! We won!"

"Thanks for doing that with him," Enid tells Raul with a smile.

"No problem. It was fun. I haven't done that since sixth grade field day."

"Oh God. I loved field day in elementary school!" Enid agrees.

"Yeah. Anything to get out of _real_ school."

A new line of police tape is rolled out to mark off the finish line for the five-hundred-yard dash. There are a lot of entrants, including Raul, Lt. Witherspoon, Mitch, several women from Oceanside, Enid, some former knigts of the Kingdom, Michonne, and half the sailors. It's Mitch who wins this time.

"So I guess you're cooking me dinner tomorrow?" Raul asks Enid.

"You didn't win."

"But I came in fourth. And you came in fifth."

"That's still not winning the race," she insists. "Why don't we cook dinner _together_?"

Raul smiles and nods. "Okay. That's fair."

The rest of the competitions unfold, and the winners are all fairly predictable. Carol comes in second in the longbow competition, which is held on the shore, just a few points behind Dianne, and another, former knight of the Kingdom takes third. Jerry wins the axe throwing, Cyndie the spear toss (with Rachel a close second, much to Carol's surprise), Henry staff, and Michonne fencing. The only surprise is Captain McBride's win in the wrestling competition, but mostly because he was an unknown factor to the other communities. The sailors, however, seem to have fully expected his victory.

After the final, winning round, the captain walks over to Cyndie, sliding his shirt back on over his muscular chest. "Did that match put you in the mood to tour the ship again tonight?" he asks.

Cyndie chuckles. "Maybe. I'll think about it. But right now, the leadership has a meeting." She nods across the way to Carol. "Assemble your council members."


	140. Chapter 140

While the fair wears on into the early evening, the leadership of the communities retreats to a long table in the old camp mess hall. Aaron and Tara represent the Hilltop, along with Enid, who, though not one of the three official leaders of the community, often serves in an advisory role. The five council members sit-in for Jamestown, and Cyndie is accompanied by her four advisors, including Rachel and Dianne. Alexandria has Michonne, Eugene, Rosita, and Father Gabriel.

They haggle about major trades first, and Gunther gets his much-desired horse – from the Hilltop. Tara will relinquish her brown mare and ride home on one of the carts. Jamestown has to offer the Hilltop their rooster, their billy goat, 500 rounds of ammunition, and an AR-15.

"This trade is conditional on me examining that horse first," Carolyn says, "to make sure it's in good health."

"And _my_ veterinarian will take a good look at that rooster and billy goat," Tara agrees.

Alexandria has been collecting spare solar panels and has more than it needs. "We're willing to trade four," Michonne says. "We have plenty of vegetables from our gardens, but we're short on meat and flour."

Jamestown offers two sacks of potato flour and thirty-nine pounds of assorted canned meat (including rabbit, duck, goat, and goose) for three of those panels. They're down one solar panel on the museum, and who knows when they'll need the spares. "I hear you have beef jerky?" Michonne says.

The heads of the Jamestown council members bend together. "We'll throw in three pounds of beef jerky as well," Carol tells her.

"Six," Father Gabriel insists.

Heads bend again. "Two pounds of beef jerky," Carol says, "two pounds of deer jerky, and two pounds of pork rinds."

Eugene perks up. "Pork rinds? Well that sounds just hunky dory."

The trade is confirmed. Cyndie offers fifteen pounds of preserved, dried fish for the other panel, and Alexandria asks for twenty-five pounds.

"Jamestown only offered you fifteen pounds of meat per panel," Dianne reasons. "And you want twenty-five pounds for one panel from us?"

"It wasn't all _fish_ ," Rosita replies. "And they also gave us two sacks of flour."

After a bit more haggling, Oceanside and Alexandria settle on twenty pounds of dried fish.

"What do we even need a solar panel for?" one of Cyndie's advisors asks her. "We don't have the infrastructure for it."

"We might need a spare for the speedboat we're going to get from Jamestown." Cyndie looks pointedly across the table at Carol.

"And what do you propose in exchange for that?" Carol asks.

"The cargo ship that washed up on our shore had a lot of unopened hard liquor bottles," Cyndie says. "And I hear you have a tavern. We'll give you forty-five bottles."

The Jamestown council members bend heads and confer.

"Sixty bottles," Gunther says when they break apart. "At least fifteen of them whiskey or bourbon, and no more than ten of them schnapps."

"And throw in two good harpoons," Lieutenant Witherspoon says. "And one of your largest nets."

Cyndie and her advisors confer and then accept the offer. "There's a spare battery for that boat," Carol says. "What will you give us for that?"

"I assumed that was included," Cyndie tells her.

"You didn't even know about it," Carol says. "How could you have assumed?"

"Captain McBride mentioned it to me."

"Ah," Carol says. "Well it wasn't included in the exchange. We didn't specify that."

Cyndie sighs. Rachel leans her head toward her and whispers a suggestion. "Six pounds of dried fish," Cyndie says.

"Fish is the last thing we need," Thomas assures them.

"So is a batter for a boat you don't own anymore," Cyndie reasons.

"We could find a way to use the battery, I'm sure," Carol replies.

Now Dianne whispers to Cyndie, who then announces, "Eighteen crystal whiskey glasses and two crystal decanters for your tavern."

"What sort of ship was this that washed up on your shore?" Gunther asks. "The Titanic?"

"It had interesting cargo," Cyndie says.

"Throw in five more bottles of liquor as well," Gunther says.

Cyndie rubs her eyes and shakes her head.

"This is cutting edge technology we're talking about," Lt. Witherspoon tells them. "It goes up to eighty miles an hour. Do you know how long it takes the _Susan Constant_ to travel eighty miles?"

"Yeah, anywhere from eleven to sixteen hours," Cyndie relies. "We have a sailboat. We know." She sighs. "Fine. Five more bottles of liquor. We mostly drink the wine, anyway."

"That ship had wine, too?" Gunther asks in disbelief. "How much?"

"None of your beeswax," Rachel tells him.

That deal now made, Aaron says, "Let's talk about that Jamestown brew. It was popular with the Hilltop crowd."

"We need ethanol for our back-up generator," Thomas says. "How about twenty-five gallons of ethanol for the keg?"

Enid laughs sharply. "Do you have any idea how long that takes to make? And how much more valuable it is than beer? You think we're trading twenty-five gallons of ethanol for sixteen gallons of _beer_?"

Thomas shrugs. "I thought I'd at least try."

Jamestown does get twenty-five gallons of ethanol, but in addition to the keg, they have to throw in a sack of oatmeal, a sack of potato flour, okra seeds, and a dozen mason jars of assorted fruit preserves.

After all the haggling over trade is done, it's time to talk about the treaty. Michonne takes charge by rolling out the existing Alliance treaty before the Jamestown council. "I drew this up. I used to be a lawyer. You can enter it exactly as is, or we can hammer out some changes."

Four heads bend together as Carolyn, Gunther, Lt. Witherspoon, and Thomas read. Carol already knows what's in it.

Lt. Witherspoon sits back. "Jamestown is happy to enter a trade alliance, but we won't enter a treaty that obligates us to go to war on behalf of our allies."

"Well that's almost the entire point of the alliance," Rosita says. "Mutual protection."

Gunther shakes his head. "Jamestown doesn't need help to protect itself."

"We're over six hundred strong, locked in by sturdy fences, and well stocked with guns and ammunition," Carolyn agrees.

"And all three of your communities together don't even total four hundred," Thomas adds.

Lt. Witherspoon taps the treaty. "This would basically obligate us to be the world police. We have everything to lose, and nothing to gain."

Tara looks at Carol. "Say something to your fellow council members."

Carol sighs. "I don't actually disagree with them. If any of you are attacked, you know Daryl and I will be there, fighting by your side. But I can't obligate Jamestown to fight."

Rosita shakes her head in disbelief. "Where's your loyalty?"

"It's to Jamestown," Carol says. "That's my _home_ now. What did you expect?"

Michonne leans back in her chair. "I would do the same thing in your position," she admits. "What if we rewrote the treaty to confine Jamestown's role to supplying arms and ammunition in the event of an attack on Oceanside, Alexandria, or the Hilltop? No bodies."

"And the rest of the Alliance wouldn't have to supply anything if Jamestown is attacked?" Gunther asks.

"You said you didn't need our help," Dianne replies coolly.

Gunther scratches the dark, three-day stubble that seems to perpetually line his cheeks. "Why don't we just agree to _sell_ you what you need to fight at a discounted rate if you're attacked?"

"A discount in exchange for _what_?" Carolyn asks.

"They could sell us what we need at a discounted rate if we're attacked," Thomas suggests.

"We won't need anything," Carolyn insists. "We have at least two guns per person and an arsenal full of ammunition. If we're ever _that_ outgunned, it's over."

Lt. Witherspoon shakes his head. "It doesn't sound like we'll be getting anything at all out of this deal."

Dianne looks across the table at Gunther and raises an eyebrow.

Gunther clears his throat. "This trade we engaged in today," he says, "has been mutually beneficial. I'd like it to continue. It can't continue if our trade partners are destroyed by some external threat. So I'm in favor of agreeing to support them with discounted weapons and ammo in the event of an attack. We'll likely supply mercenaries, too. I'm sure there are Jamestown men who would enjoy the adventure in exchange for the promise of liquor. And Oceanside seems to have plenty of that in this storeroom." He looks around at the crates stacked against the wall. Then he glances at Dianne. "But I can't agree to a promise of _conscripted_ bodies, not given the power imbalance at play. It really would be putting Jamestown at the raw end of the deal."

The discussion continues, and it's eventually agreed that Jamestown will supply weapons and ammunition cheaply to any community that is attacked. They'll also send out a call for volunteers to fight in exchange for liquor, but they won't be obligated to go to war on behalf of the Alliance.

A new treaty is drafted and signed. The annual trade fair will continue. Oceanside will be the host, because it's the hub that's easiest for all three other communities to reach. Hosting is a big obligation, but it also means Oceanside doesn't have to travel. They stick with November. Jamestown also agrees to a less formal trade trip every May, when it will sail a ship with men and goods. They'll trade with Oceanside and any trade representatives of the Hilltop or Alexandria who make their way to the peninsula, but without all the trouble of a fair.

Next, Rachel suggests to Cyndie that she and Henry be allowed to take the speedboat to Jamestown in two and half weeks, during the first week of December. "You know how to drive one. The three of us could go."

"I'm not sure about driving so far," Cyndie says. "It sounds like it's dangerous along that river."

"Jamestown cleared out the pirates," Rachel insists. "They secured the trade route. And you'd get to see Captain McBride again."

"We wanted the speedboat so we could go crabbing more easily out on the Bay," Cyndie tells her. "Not for going _all the way_ to Jamestown."

"Henry really wants to see his little sister. We'd only stay two or three nights."

"My concern is that if something goes wrong," Cyndie tells her, "for instance if the battery dies – "

"- We have a replacement," Rachel interrupts.

"Or the engine fails," Cyndie continues, "we'll be stranded out there. If that happens, the speedboat won't _sail_. If it dies while we're out on the Bay crabbing, we can always paddle a rescue raft the three or four miles back to Oceanside. But we can't paddle a raft 125 miles if we end up in the middle of the James River."

"If you don't arrive on the expected day," Lt. Witherspoon says, "the next morning, we'll send a ship up river looking for you." He glances around. "If that's okay with the council." The other four council members nod.

"I suppose it's okay to risk it then," Cyndie agrees.

"Dianne should probably come on that December trip with you," Gunther says. "You'll need security, and she used to be a knight of the Kingdom."

Dianne smiles wryly. "I suppose you'll offer to host me in your cabin?"

"Uh…well…I don't exactly have a cabin," Gunther admits with some embarrassment. "I'll have a private room in January, when the dorm is built. For now I'm unfortunately in the barracks with sixteen other men. But we'll find somewhere to put all of you up."

"You're a council member and the assistant farm manager," Dianne asks, "and you don't have your own place?"

Gunther shrugs. "I was nobody when the cabins and huts were first being divvied up. And even if I was somebody, I wouldn't have taken one from a couple or family."

"But you said you lived there seven years. In all that time, you never built a cabin?"

"I didn't see the need, really. I had a bed and a roof over my head."

"Interesting."

"What's interesting about it? I'm a busy man," Gunther says defensively. "I have a lot of responsibilities. And I hardly saw the point of a cabin for _one_ person."

"Henry and Rachel will stay with us, of course," Carol says to divert from the awkward exchange. "I bet our mayor and his wife will be happy to host one of you on their couch. And there's always the possibility of camping out in the theater. The museum has heat."

"You're coming, though?" Gunther asks Dianne uncertainly.

"Well, someone _should_ probably provide extra security," Dianne agrees. "Cyndie has to drive. Rachel and Henry are great in hand to hand combat, but they can't _shoot_ that well. I think I better go with them."

"Then it's decided?" Carol asks hopefully. "You'll come in December?"

"We'll come," Cyndie agrees.

Michonne rolls up the treaty and ties it closed with a black silk ribbon. "This meeting was a lot more efficient than I thought it was going to be." She extends a hand across the table to Carol. "Welcome to the Alliance. Again."

Carol smiles, stretches out her hand, and shakes Michonne's, like she did almost six years ago, across a similar table in the Kingdom.


	141. Chapter 141

The _Susan Constant_ casts a shadow on the pebbly sand. Raul brings the roaring motorcycle to an abrupt stop on the shore, a foot from where Daryl stands. It jerks in place, and he almost falls off, but he catches himself with a boot.

"Let up sooner next time," Daryl tells him. "Ease into the stop."

Raul grins. "That was _awesome_!"

Daryl traded the Hilltop distiller his flask of whiskey and some ammo for a half gallon of the man's private stash of ethanol, and he's been teaching Raul to ride while the fair carries on. Hershel, Judith, and RJ aren't interested in playing with him anymore. They've been adopted by a gaggle of eleven- and twelve-year-olds.

Raul kicks the stand down and dismounts. "Thanks. Now I can say I learned to drive."

"Ride," Daryl tells him.

"Yeah. Ride." He glances toward the distant tree line. "When do you think Enid and Carol will be done with that meeting?"

"Dunno. Soon, probably. 'S roll 'er back in."

He walks beside the bike as Raul pushes it toward the trees. "Do you think I'll ever see Enid again after tomorrow?"

"Sure. Gonna be a fair every year. Just make sure ya get on the ship."

"Yeah," Raul says quietly as he bends lower to push the bike out of an indention in the sand. "In a _year_."

"Shit, kid, do you fall for every damn girl that pays ya any attention at all?"

Raul glowers and pushes the bike faster.

Daryl keeps pace with him. "Trust me, little brother – most women ain't worth the trouble. 'N the one that is – she's worth the wait. Year. Two years. _Seven_ years."

Raul slows his pace. "I guess I don't feel like I'm going to be alive in seven years. The first time I started to really think there was a future, in Williamsburg…it all fell apart."

"Then what're ya storin' up all that shit for?"

"I don't know," Raul admits. "In case I have to run."

"How ya gonna run with all that shit?"

Raul shakes his head as he trudges on. "I don't know. I don't know why I do _anything_ I do."

Daryl grabs the fender of the bike and holds it in place, which forces Raul to stop moving. Raul, slipping his hand off one handlebar but holding the bike steady by the other, turns to him.

"Hey, I used to feel like that, too," Daryl tells him. "Like it was all day-to-day, and I didn't have no idea where I was goin'. Like I was tryin' to get somewhere, but I didn't even know where somewhere was. But ya got time to figure all that shit out. Yer only twenty-one. Jamestown ain't fallen apart in eightyears. Alliance ain't fallen apart 'n six."

Raul looks at the tire path in the sand. "I don't care if nothing romantic happens with Enid," he says. He looks back at Daryl. "I just _like_ her. I feel like we could have been friends in another world."

"Hell. Ya can be friends in this one. Tell ya what. Carol's gonna get the council to agree to a trade trip in early May. You and me, we'll get on that ship. Take the bike. And then we'll ride from Oceanside to the Hilltop. Hell, I want to see Hershel anyhow. 'N I'll have made 'nuff fuel by then."

"What about Carol? I mean, we can't fit three on the bike."

"Think she'll wanna stay with Sweetheart anyhow." He'll probably want to stay with Sweetheart, too, but it would be good to see Hershel, Aaron, Jesus, Tara, and Enid, and maybe he can get Michonne to come to the Hilltop with Judith and RJ.

Raul grins. "That would be awesome. That's only five months from now."

"Five 'n a half," Daryl clarifies.

"Enid and I can trade herbs. And I can teach her how to mix some more medicines she hasn't tried yet." He starts rolling the bike forward again with a little more pep in his step.

[*]

As they walk from the mess hall back to the camp, Carol strolls between Michonne and Enid. She can hear Gunther and Dianne talking behind her.

"I'm sorry if that came off wrong, about the cabin," Dianne tells him.

"You thought I was big man on campus, and you're disappointed to learn I'm not," Gunther says in a wounded tone. "I get it."

"It's not that. I was given a cabin to share when I moved here. And now that Beatrice has moved, they let me keep it. Oceanside was generous, and I'd done nothing yet to earn it. I'm surprised Jamestown doesn't take better care of you, given all that you've done and are doing for it. They haven't offered to help you build a cabin in all this time?"

"That's not quite how things work at Jamestown. There's a market for everything. There's no chieftain. No King. No Queen. It's not what you're used to."

"Oceanside isn't a tyranny," Dianne says. "Neither was the Kingdom."

"I know. But it's different. It's just…different. If I were to build a cabin, I would have to barter for my supplies and barter for the labor to assist me. It never seemed a good investment for a single man. And, to be honest with you, I was wasting a lot of bartering goods on booze until very recently."

"Ah. Well, we all have our coping mechanisms. I suppose mine is being too snide."

Gunther chuckles.

"But they are finally giving you an apartment?" Dianne asks. "In January?"

"Like I said, there's a market for everything. I'll pay a modest rent for the room, just like everyone else in the dorm, to the community storehouse, to make building the dorm worth the investment."

"Interesting. It's fascinating the way different communities do things."

"Don't get me wrong. Jamestown isn't a Dickens novel," Gunther tells her. "Old people and orphans do get taken care of. Other people work to support them."

"I _am_ disappointed you don't have your own place," Dianne admits, "but maybe because that means we don't get to stay together when I come in December."

"Oh really? You made it sound like you weren't sure you even wanted to come."

Dianne is quiet for a moment, and then she says, "I've been enjoying your company more than I want to admit. That's also one of my coping mechanisms, I suppose. The walls I put up. Maybe I should have chosen liquor instead."

"Well, if I can give up the liquor, then maybe you can give up the walls. Though, to be fair, I've only given up the liquor for about sixty hours now. But maybe you can make it without the walls for the next thirty-six?"

"I'll try."

As they near the cabins, Daryl and Raul emerge from the tree line, Raul pushing Daryl's motorcycle. He kicks down the stand, leans the bike, and waves to Enid. Enid waves back. "Raul's nice," she tells Carol.

"He is," Carol agrees.

"And he hasn't even come onto me. I can't tell you how many times I've been hit on today by sailors and guards."

Carol opens her mouth to reply, but Enid's already walking ahead of her toward the bike. Carol catches up with Enid and kisses Daryl on the cheek.

"How'd it go?" he asks.

"Good," Carol replies. "We got Freckles."

"Hilltop's horse?" Daryl asks in surprise.

"Yeah. We also got three solar panels, twenty-five gallons of ethanol, and lots of booze for the tavern. Henry and Rachel are coming on the speedboat in a couple weeks. Can we have Sweetheart's birthday party while they're there?"

"Sure."

"Did you trade for Daryl's bike?" Enid asks Raul.

"Think I'd give up m'bike?" Daryl asks her.

Enid shrugs. "Well, Raul was bragging abut how much loot he has. I thought maybe he offered you the moon."

"I wasn't _bragging_ ," Raul insists. "I was just…talking."

Enid smiles. "You _were_ bragging. But it's okay. It's something to be proud of. It takes a lot of discipline to store things up. Most people just blow through stuff these days."

Raul smiles and ducks his head.

Daryl sniffs the air. "Smell that?"

"They roasted your turkey, Pookie. It's at the food booth for dinner."

"That turkey ain't near big enough to feed everyone."

"Cyndie said everyone gets a sliver of turkey meat," Carol tells him. "But Marcus apparently took the speedboat out early this morning and caught a bunchmore crabs, so there's crab meat, too."

"And more baked apples from the Hilltop," Enid tells her. "Alexandria is putting out cherry tomatoes from its green house."

"And I heard we're offering up a few bags of potato chips," Raul says. "Enough for everyone to have a handful anyway."

"You have potato chips?" ask Enid, wide eyed.

"Homemade and salted," Raul tells her. "They keep about a month. Do you want to go to the food booth with me?"

"Sure."

Carol watches them head off together as Daryl relocates his bike out of the way by a tree. He returns and holds his arm out to her. "Food?"

"Well aren't you the gentleman." Carol laces her arm through his. "Don't mind if I do."

[*]

"You might have consulted with me first before promising Raul that," Carol says as they settle at an empty picnic bench a few minutes later.

"Sorry," Daryl murmurs. "Didn't think ya'd mind."

"I don't mind you going in May. Or taking Raul and the bike to the Hilltop. I know you miss Hershel, and I know you need to wander sometimes. It's why I made you the trade rep at the Kingdom, so you could get out for a few days at a time. I just mind not being _consulted_."

"Consult ya next time."

"You better." She munches a potato chip.

"'N ain't true I need to wander like I used to," Daryl says. "Miss the baby. Miss Jamestown."

"Yeah?"

He nods. "Mhmm. 'N 'm sure as shit gonna miss you in May. Wanna come? Could borrow Dianne's horse maybe, ride from Oceanside to the Hilltop?"

"And do what with the baby?"

He shrugs. "Bring 'er."

"I might not have her fully potty trained quite yet." Sweetheart will be about seventeen months in May. Sophia wasn't fully potty trained until she was almost three, but in this world of nondisposable diapers and hand-washed laundry, the urgency to potty train early is much greater. Judith was completely out of diapers by nineteen months. Carol plans for Sweetheart to be out of them around the same time. "And with what happened with the pirates…I think I better wait until that route is traveled a couple more times before I take her. Maybe we can bring her for the annual fair in November. She'll be almost two."

"A'ight."

"Besides, you _think_ you don't need to wander anymore, but by May, you're going to be restless and irritable. I know it. We're going to need our space from each other for a little while."

"Pfft."

"Absence makes the heart grow fonder," she reminds him.

"Thought it was outta sight, outta mind."

She pouts. "Am I out of your mind when I'm out of sight?"

"Nah. Never. Well…'cept the times when there ain't nothin' a'tall in m'mind."

Carol laughs.

Tara takes a seat next to her. "That whole meeting went surprisingly well."

"I thought so," Carol agrees.

"Everyone in your town is trying to fix me up with your veterinarian."

Carol laughs. "I guess they think it's inevitable because you're both lesbians."

"I think the sailors like the idea of it," Tara says as she cracks a crab leg and slides it apart to reveal the meat. "It feeds their fantasies."

"Carolyn's a lesbian?" Daryl asks.

"Why do you think she doesn't have fifteen Jamestown men chasing her all the time?" Carol asks.

Daryl shrugs.

Tara wipes her fingers on a napkin. "She says she does have about three Jamestown men chasing her. They're sure they're going to turn her. It made me a little jealous. No men at the Hilltop ever chase me."

"Well, that one ex-Savior I had to beat the shit out of," Daryl says.

"Groping isn't chasing. And you should have let _me_ beat the shit out of him."

"Well, ya got to stab him the second time he did it," Daryl reasons.

"He's not here is he?" Carol asks.

"No," Tara replies casually. "He got an infection from the stab wound, and he died. But that's not the kind of chasing I mean. It sounds like the Jamestown men just flirt with her. No one _ever_ flirts with me."

"Hey, gorgeous," Michonne says as she sits down next to Daryl. She winks across the table at Tara.

Tara rolls her eyes.

Fluttering her eyelashes, Michonne pushes her plate across the table. "Crack my crab legs for me?"

"When did you become so delicate?" Tara asks.

Michonne chuckles. She slides the plate back and picks up a leg, which she cracks and pulls apart before sucking the meat out with a loud slurp.

Jerry sits down on the other side of Carol, causing the bench to raise slightly for a moment and then settle again.

"Where are all the kids?" Carol asks.

Jerry shrugs and Michonne replies, "Who knows. I just know they're in good company."

"They'll be ready to conk out as soon as it's bedtime," Jerry says. "Then Dianne and Gunther and I are going to play board games once they're out."

Carol chuckles. "I wouldn't be so sure of that. I bet those two are going to bed early tonight."

"Why?" Jerry asks.

Michonne plucks up her tin cup of water. "Romance is in the air. It's always that way on fair day, isn't it? Ezekiel's legacy lives on."

"A toast," Jerry says, raising his cup, "to the king."

Carol watches Daryl out of the corner of her eye as she lifts her own cup to respond to Jerry's request, worried it might make him uncomfortable. But he drops his crab leg, slaps his hands together to dust off the seasoning, and picks up his own cup. "To 'Zeke," he says, and they all clank cups.


	142. Chapter 142

Somehow Daryl got roped into camping with not only Hershel, but Judith as well. He decided not to pitch a tent on the shore, where a potentially rowdy party might be unwinding, but is headed with the kids for a spot in the woods instead. RJ was too tired to join in the fun, so he's currently dead asleep in the second guest bedroom of Cyndie's cabin, where Michonne will join him later. Because Cyndie is "touring the ship" with Captain McBride again, she offered up her bedroom to Tara and her couch to Rosita, which means a quiet party of old girlfriends tonight.

The cork of the wine bottle pops open as the fire crackles in the hearth. "How much ammo did you trade for this?" Michonne asks.

"Seven rounds," Carol answers. She picked the bottle up at one of the individual Oceanside booths.

"Wow. That's a lot," Tara says.

"Not really. It's two to three rounds of ammo for just a pint of beer at the tavern, depending on the day's prices."

"How much ammo does Jamestown have?" Michonne asks as she pours.

"A _lot_ ," Carol concedes. "And we reload. But with the extra supply of liquor we got in trade today, the price of beer may go down for a while."

Michonne hands a glass of wine to Rosita. "No sailor for you tonight?"

Rosita shrugs as she takes the glass and settles on the far end of the couch next to Tara and Carol, who each pluck up their own glasses form the coffee table. "I already had a sailor this afternoon. I thought it would be more fun to hang out with all of you tonight. How often do we get to do this?"

"Never," Tara says, and clinks Rostia's glass with her own.

Michonne plucks up the last glass and settles in the papasan. She sinks back into it and almost spills her wine, laughs, and tries to get comfortable. Eventually, she opts to sit cross legged on the floor instead. "So who was your sailor?" she asks.

Rosita looks at Carol. "Tyler?" she ventures.

"You mean _Taylor_?" Carol asks.

"Yeah. That was it."

"He's _young_." Carol sips her wine.

"I know, but the young ones are always so _eager_ ," Rosita says. "And they can do a repeat performance within the half hour."

Michonne's laugh makes her almost spit out her wine, but she swallows it down. "How young?"

"I'm sure he's legal," Rosita insists.

"I think he's twenty-four," Carol says.

"And I'm only thirty-four," Rosita reminds them.

"I always forget what a baby you are," Michonne says.

"That's not a _baby_ ," Tara insists. "I'm only thirty-seven."

"Can we not talk about this?" Carol asks. "I'm the only one here who's over the hill already."

Michonne points her wine glass at her. "You're also the only one here with a husband, so I wouldn't be complaining if I were you."

"Sorry," Carol murmurs sympathetically.

"I wasn't fishing for sympathy," Michonne says. "And Darius would have moved in with me. But I don't want anyone but Rick. Not for something _that_ serious."

"I hear you," Rosita says. "It's one thing to get your back scratched. It's another to sign up for something like that. Most men can't be trusted not to leave you."

"That's not my concern," Michonne says. "I just don't think I could ever love anyone like I did Rick. It wouldn't be fair for me to live with someone else. He'd always be living in Rick's shadow."

"So how are you getting your back scratched in Alexandria?" Tara asks Rosita.

Rosita shrugs. "Well, it sounds like Darius is available."

"Don't you dare!" Michonne tells her. "Well, at least wait another month." She takes a sip of her wine.

"I'm kidding," Rosita assures her. "I have a friends with benefits situation."

"With Eugene?" Tara asks.

"God no! It's Marco."

"Who's Marco?" Carol asks. She feels a bit out of the loop. It's strange to think that Daryl knows more of the Alliance people than she does, but he made trade rounds monthly to each of the communities, while she was largely sequestered in the Kingdom, except for an occasional trip to the Hilltop to learn martial arts from Jesus, or the occasional journey to Alexandria to visit and confer with Michonne.

"He's a soldier," Rosita tells her. "A guard. He wandered up to our gates about three years ago, with his older sister and her teenage son."

"And he doesn't mind you hooking up with sailors while you're away?" Tara asks.

"I said he was a friend with benefits. Not a _boyfriend_."

"Could he be a boyfriend?" Tara wants to know.

"No. No one can be a boyfriend because no one sticks around."

"I think Carol would beg to differ with you," Michonne says before taking another sip of wine. "She's had a puppy at her heels for over eight years."

"I wouldn't call Daryl a _puppy_ ," Tara says.

Carol shrugs. "He can be. Sometimes. And other times he's a snarling dog. But always loyal." She's lucky, and she knows it, and she feels a bit bad being the only one in the room blessed with such a situation, so she offers, "I have another bottle of wine when this one's gone."

"You don't need to share _all_ your wine with us," Michonne insists.

"It'll lighten my backpack. It's too full."

"Well, _I'm_ not going to argue with you," Rosita says. "I haven't had wine since the Hilltop stopped making it two years ago. Something ridiculous about needing grape juice for the kids."

"Mamas need grape juice too." Michonne grins and sips. "Especially this mama. Judith has gotten incredibly _sassy_ lately."

" _Your_ daughter?" Tara asks. "Sassy? No way!"

Michonne chuckles. "Fair enough. I hope Daryl barks some sense into her tonight, though. She'll listen to him in a way she won't listen to me."

The evening wears on as they talk about their communities and their plans for the future. They open the second bottle of wine and pour four more glasses and then reminisce about the past.

"I still can't believe you ever let Negan _out_ of that cell," Tara tells Michonne.

"It was better to make him earn his keep than to keep feeding him for free," Rosita reasons.

"Honestly," Michonne admits, "when I first did it, I was hoping he'd try to hurt somebody so I could have a reason to kill him right then and there, without breaking my promise to Rick. I kept waiting for it to happen. But it didn't. He just did the work. A year passed. Two. And then when that gang tried to breach our gates, and he helped fight them back…" She shakes her dead. "He died defending Alexandria. Who would have ever guessed it?"

They remember old, mutual friends and tell happy stories of the good times that weaved between the bad. They raise their almost empty glasses to the memory of Rick, Ezekiel, Abraham, Glenn, Maggie, Carl, and Sasha. By the time Carol goes to bed, the sun is just four hours from rising.

 **[*]**

The next day, their last at Oceanside, the crew and fishermen take the _Susan Constant_ a few miles out on the Bay and spend several hours crabbing. They ask some of the fisherwomen from Oceanside to join them, not only for their help, but their company, with the agreement that they will feed everyone tonight and then split any excess crab meat between the two communities.

Those who didn't fish spend the day hanging out with old friends or new ones. Raul practices riding the motorcycle, and he takes Enid joy riding once he gets the hang of it. When they aren't back by the time the _Susan Constant_ returns with cages bursting with crabs, Daryl assumes they ran out of gas. He trades some ammo to the Hilltop distiller for another quarter gallon of his personal stash of ethanol and goes tracking.

He finds them a mile outside the camp, on the mainland side of the peninsula. Raul's sitting sideways on the motorcycle, his boots on the ground and his hands on Enid's hips, while she stands between his legs and kisses him. Enid steps away when she hears Daryl approaching.

Raul, flushing slightly, stands straight and asks, "Hey, what are you doing here?"

Daryl holds up the can. "Figured ya ran out of fuel."

"Uh…no. I think we still have plenty," Raul says. "We didn't actually go that far."

"We weren't riding the whole time," Enid explains. "We stopped and walked and talked."

"Mhmhm. Well, 's gonna be dinner time soon." Daryl turns on his heels and walks back toward the camp.

Five minutes later, Raul and Enid roar past him on the motorcycle. When Daryl finally gets back, Carol has held onto a plate of food for him, which is still slightly warm. She's playing cards with Aaron, Jerry, and Michonne. Daryl sits beside her, shovels food into his mouth, and listens to the soothing murmur of laughter and conversation.

Captain McBride stops by their table. "I've talked Cyndie into supplying us all with a nip of vodka from that washed-up cargo ship, if we'll set out the rest of our potato chips. Council approved? Lt. Witherspoon said yes."

"I'm in favor," Carol says. "You'll have to find the others and ask them."

McBride looks around at the various cabins and picnic benches. "That might be a challenge. I think Thomas and Gunther are both…preoccupied. Possibly Carolyn too."

"Well, go ahead and make the deal, Captain. They can't complain if they weren't available."

McBride smiles, salutes her casually, and wanders off. Somewhere closer to the fairgrounds, a fiddle and banjo strike up a gig.

[*]

It's hard saying goodbye the next morning as the communities part ways, Alexandria and the Hilltop to the right, toward the mainland, and Jamestown to the left, across the shore to the pier. They linger for awhile in the clearing by the cabins.

Tara pets her mare and kisses its nose. "Take good care of Freckles," she says.

"I always treat my work animals well," Gunther assures her. "She'll have a fine home at Jamestown."

"I hope she doesn't get seasick."

"I've got a little something I can feed her that will help," Carolyn promises her. "If you're ever in Jamestown for some reason, look me up."

Tara laughs. "We don't _have_ to, you know, just because we're the only two."

"Who said anything about _having_ to?" Carolyn asks. She takes the reins of the mare and begins walking toward the shore.

"She's not really my type," Tara whispers to Gunther.

"Beautiful and smart?" Gunther asks. "What _is_ your type?"

"She seems a little uptight," Tara says.

Gunther shrugs. He smiles at Dianne, who stands beside him. "But it's amazing how a little romance can relax a woman."

Dianne rolls her eyes, but then she leans over, kisses him on the cheek, and says, "Two and a half weeks."

"You'll like Jamestown," he assures her.

After Gunther's said his goodbye to Dianne, Carol hugs her. "Thank you for getting the Kingdom people here safely."

Dianne nods. "It's good to have you in the Alliance again."

Carol says her farewell to Tara next, and then Michonne and the kids, Enid and Hershel, Jerry and the boys…Eventually she wanders over to where Daryl and Aaron are embracing with manly pats on the back. "Let me get my hug in," she insists.

It's a half hour before they've exchanged their farewells with everyone, and Carol's eyes are misting as they make their way to the ship.

[*]

Captain McBride has lined up the crew and passengers of the _Susan Constant_ along the starboard side and is pacing up and down the line as he assigns jobs and sleeping and dinning shifts and reviews the expectations for the journey home. Carol hides a yawn behind her hand after he passes her.

"Ya didn't sleep well last night neither?" Daryl whispers.

"Stayed up late talking."

"Kids stayed up late gigglin'," Daryl says.

Carol chuckles.

Captain McBride comes to a stop before Seaman Joe Harrison. "Harrison," he booms, "you'll be emptying and cleaning out _all_ of the chamber pots for the entire duration of the journey and swabbing the decks at six a.m. sharp each morning."

"Captain, sir," the sailor pleads. "That's far too much on top of my usual duties as a sailor."

" _Is_ it far too much?" asks Captain McBride, taking a step back and looking him up and down with disdain. "Or was the amount of ammunition you offered that Oceanside woman in exchange for fellatio far too _little_?" All the other sailors look straight at the deck to hide their smirks. "To make the offer at all was insulting enough. But my God, man! To make an offer so stingy!"

Seaman Harrison's face turns tomato-red. "It's not as if _you_ weren't fraternizing, Captain."

McBrides closes the three steps between them with hard footfalls, until his left shoulder has bumped the sailor's. He hisses something in the sailor's ear that causes Seaman Harrison's face to fade from red to white. Then the captain steps back again and looks up and down the line. "I've made our apologies for this sailor's unacceptable behavior. The Chieftain of Oceanside assured me she was, on the whole, pleased with our visit, and Oceanside will be happy to welcome Jamestown on its shores again in May." He turns his gaze to Seaman Harrison. "You of course will not be selected for that crew. And you'll be cleaning the ships on Friday and Saturday night for the next two months." He extends a hand toward Lt. Witherspoon. "The lieutenant is in charge whenever I'm in my cabin. Let's get these sails up and catch these winds and head on home!"

"Aye, aye, Captain!"

Footfalls clamor across the decks and Lt. Witherspoon shouts commands to the sailors as Captain McBride seizes the ship's wheel. Carol turns back to look at the shore and the trees that hide the campgrounds where she passed so many lovely hours with old friends these past three days. She feels like she's leaving home and going home at the same time. Daryl slides a comforting arm around her shoulder as the ship eases from the dock.


	143. Chapter 143

Carol and Daryl take an oil lamp to the bow of the ship and hang it on a lantern poll. Carol leans back in his arms as she watches the moonlight paint a flickering yellow trail across the black waters and listens to the murmur of conversation between the lieutenant and Mitch at the ship's wheel. The lieutenant is navigating at the moment, while Mitch sits on a nearby barrel and keeps him company into the night.

"It's beautiful," she says.

Daryl nuzzles her neck and whispers, "So're you, Beautiful."

Carol smiles, crosses her arms over his, and squeezes. It's not often she gets small compliments. Daryl's regard for her is obvious in his actions, but the words are less common, so she basks in them now, and in the warmth of his arms, which provide a shield against the cool mid-November winds.

He kisses a small bit of exposed flesh at the base of her neck and murmurs, "Still don't feel real sometimes."

"What doesn't?"

"Us. This."

"Well it is real." She turns in his arms, drapes her arms around his neck and kisses him until Captain McBride, emerging from below deck, walks by.

"Get a room!" he shouts jovially. Then he stops and turns. "Mine's free now."

Carol pulls away from her husband. "Is it two a.m. already?" They were assigned the captain's cabin from two to eight, for six hours of shut eye.

"It's only one, but I woke up," McBride replies. "And when I'm up, I'm up. Go ahead and take it. Witherspoon!" he calls. "I've got the wheel. Time to nap. There's a bunk free in the crew quarters."

[*]

Winds are fair and the trip home is speedy. The _Susan Constant_ arrives in the early morning, about the same time it departed Oceanside two days ago. The guard in the lighthouse must see them coming and signal to the dock, because sailors are already waiting to tie up the ship when they arrive. Garland and Shannon are there, too. Sweetheart rides Garland's hip, VanDaryl rests on Shannon's, and little Gary is skipping up and down the dock. The mayor urges Sweetheart to wave at her parents as the ship comes in, and she does.

Daryl and Carol, eager to greet their daughter, are among the first one's off the _Susan Constant_. They thunder down the ramp as soon as it's lowered, and Carol takes Sweetheart from Garland and hugs her tightly. "I missed you so much, Sweetie."

"Mama mama," Sweetheart says as Carol kisses her, and Carol draws back in surprise at the word, which the baby seems to _mean_. She's further shocked when Sweetheart half turns in her arms and smiles at Daryl. "Dada dada."

Carol's never seen such an expression on Daryl's face before – as though his heart has stopped beating and he has to will it to start again. When he lets go of his breath, he says, "C'mere, baby girl," and reaches for her. Carol hands their daughter over and she snuggles happily against Daryl's chest.

"She's been saying that every night since you left," Shannon tells her. "She looks at the door in the evening and says mama dada." A wave of guilt sweeps over Carol, and Shannon must see it in her face, because she hastens, "Only for a _minute_ , and then I always distracted her. She's been very happy. She's had a blast with Gary and VanDaryl and Dog."

"Dog's in the barn," Garland tells Daryl. "On rat duty." He looks over Carol's shoulder at the men disembarking the ship, and a line jumps in his jaw.

Carol steps aside as Arnold McBride walks solemnly forward.

"Why are you wearing that hat?" Garland asks him in a hollow tone that suggests he's already guessed the reason.

McBride plucks the hat from his head and runs a hand through his wavy red hair. He swallows. "I'm sorry to report, Mayor Barron, that we met with some trouble on our voyage."

[*]

Carol and Daryl spend the morning at home, playing with Sweetheart and having a quiet, early lunch together. At Jerry's urging, Carol picked up several small jars of baby food from Hilltop's booth at the fair – food that had been grown, prepared, and packaged by Nabila. When Daryl tries to feed the baby puréed sweet potato, Sweetheart sternly closes her lips.

"Fine," he tells her. "More for Daddy." He dips her tiny spoon in the jar, draws it out coated with carrots, and then licks it clean, front and back, with a sloppy tongue and a satisfied, " _Mmmmmmmm_!"

"No!" Sweetheart yells.

"Ya hear that?" Daryl asks.

Carol, who's been clearing their own lunch dishes, sits down in the empty chair at the table. "How many words did she learn while we were gone?"

"Dunno." He dips the spoon in the sweet potatoes and offers it to Sweetheart again, and this time, she sucks it down with an _mmmmmm!_

When he takes her down from the highchair later, Sweetheart crawls over to the living room and pulls up on the armchair. She walks to the edge of the arm, inches a leg out, and then takes one aided step before grabbing the wicker coffee table for support. She holds onto the table as she side steps all the way down its edge. Then she turns and looks at the couch. Sweetheart inches out one leg, takes another unaided step, and grabs the arm for support. After walking along the arm to the back of the couch, she looks around for some other piece of furniture to lava-tag-hop her way to. She spies the rocking chair in her open bedroom, but it's too far. She takes three completely unaided steps toward it and then tumbles onto her hands and knees. "Uh-oh!" she says.

"Uh oh is right," Carol tells her as she comes over to pluck her up. "We're in trouble if you're walking already."

[*]

A memorial service is held for the Captain David Cummins in the early afternoon, and a cross is nailed into the ground above his empty grave. There's a lot of sniffling and some outright weeping, and when Judge Ana, who's been holding it together with a stern face, breaks down, lets out a gasp, and then inhales a cry, Sheriff Earl, who's standing beside her, slowly turns and walks away back toward the settlement.

"Are they still trying to patch things up?" Carol whispers to Shannon.

"They're _trying_ ," Shannon replies quietly. "I'm not so sure they're _succeeding_."

The full council meets immediately after the memorial service. Garland congratulates them on a reasonable treaty and beneficial trades, and the council approves the regular trade trips in May and November.

"We should discuss the captain's position," Carol says. "Tradition dictates that we promote the commander to the position, but the charter allows us to appoint _anyone_ , and the new captain can then choose his own officers from among the rank and file." She looks at Lt. Witherspoon, then Deputy Thomas, and finally Gunther. "Some of us are of the opinion that Arnold McBride should assume that role permanently, given the way he successfully took charge in the midst of the turmoil."

"I'm not sure how Commander Lawson is going to take that," Carolyn cautions.

"You're always the hold out, aren't you?" Gunther asks her.

"It's a fair concern," Garland says. "If he has much loyalty among the sailors, there could be grumbling. The last thing I want is another mutiny on my hands."

"There won't be," Lt. Witherspoon says. "He's not as popular with the sailors as McBride. I suspect Captain Cummins promoted him to that position only because…well…I don't want to speak ill of the dead, but as we all know, the captain has had affairs."

"Affairs?" Barry asks. "Plural? How many married women did he sleep with?"

"I - "

"- Did he sleep with _my_ wife?"

"No," Lt. Witherspoon assures him. "She's…No."

"She's what?" Barry asks.

"Nothing."

"No, go on and say it." Barry half stands up in his chair and leans over the table toward the lieutenant. "What _is_ my wife?"

Garland yanks him back down by his shirt collar and says, simply, "Sit. James meant no insult."

Barry brushes Garland off with a yank of his shoulder, but he stays seated.

"I don't see what that has to do with the captain promoting Lawson to the position of commander," Garland says.

The lieutenant sighs. "Captain Cummins had another affair. It was with Lawson's wife."

"At least it wasn't _mine_ ," Barry mutters.

"Lawson bartered his wife for rank?" Dr. Ahmad asks with disbelief.

"No," Lt. Witherspoon replies. "Lawson didn't know about the affair. Initially. When he found out, he and the captain fought, and I think the captain promoted him to appease him. To keep it all from becoming public."

"So Lawson bartered his wife for rank," Dr. Ahmad repeats.

"I guess you could see it that way," Lt. Witherspoon replies.

"Who else knew about these affairs, besides you and Lawson?" Garland asks.

"Just McBride. And neither of us knew about Ana. He was more careful when he started that affair later. We knew about Mrs. Lawson, but neither of us ever used that information to our advantage, I swear. We treated it as none of our business."

Garland blows out a weary sigh. "I thought better of David than that."

"He was a good captain," Lt. Witherspoon says. "Aside from the affairs."

"And the cover up," Garland says. "Promoting someone based on a personal concern rather than based on that man's competence."

"Well, I'm in favor of demoting Commander Lawson," Dr. Ahmad says. "After hearing all this."

"We can't demote officers," Carol says. "We can only select the captain. Then he can demote and promote officers."

"So let's make McBride captain, then," Thomas says. "Is everyone fine with that? Carolyn? You had a problem with it?"

"No. I agree that McBride really stepped up out there," Carolyn replies. "I didn't say I was opposed to assigning him permanently to the position. I just thought we had to be ready for Commander Lawson's negative reaction and the reactions of any loyal sailors who might feel he was slighted. But that was before I knew about all _this_."

"All in favor of making Arnold McBride captain of the Jamestown Navy?" Garland asks. All nine hands go up. "Then it's decided. Lieutenant, please inform him and tell him to submit his chosen list of officers to the council by tomorrow evening."

"Yes, mayor."

After the meeting adjourns, Gunther asks Carol to help him steady a cart full of liquor as Hilltop's former mare, Freckles, drags it up to the tavern. "I want to get it there before they re-open for dinner. Linda's going to be thrilled when she sees all this."

"She's not going to be so thrilled when you tell her about Dianne, though," Carol says, feeling a bit sympathetic for the older woman.

"Well, maybe I don't have to mention that right away."

Linda _is_ thrilled to see the cart-full of liquor, and she gets Candy, Trisha, and Deputy Andrew, who has come to talk with his wife before heading off on his patrol rounds, to help bring it all in. It doesn't take long, between the six of them. Gunther asks Deputy Andrew to take the horse and cart to the barn on his way to work, and Carol turns the sign to closed when he's gone. "I know it's after hours," she says, "but could I _possibly_ get a drink?" She wants to unwind from the council meeting so she's more relaxed when she goes home to her little family again.

"You absolutely can," Linda tells her, "On the house. I'll pay for it out of my manager's cut of the liquor sales this week, as a thank you for this fantastic trade. And Gunther, I'll make you a decaf coffee."

"No need. Water will do."

"What's your pleasure, Carol?" Linda asks. "I can mix you up a Manhattan. I make my own walnut bitters."

"I don't even know what a Manhattan is." Or what bitters are, for that matter. Carol's heard the term, in the old world, but she never knew what it was back then.

"I suspect you're about to find out." Gunther swings his pack up onto the bar as Linda goes to work mixing the cocktail. Carol sits on a stool not far from him. He unzips the pack and says, "I've brought you ladies presents."

Candy squeals and runs behind the bar opposite his pack. "Private booze for us?"

"No. You need booze even less than I do," Gunther assures her. "But when's the last time you had a chocolate brownie?" He hands Candy one of the Mountain House snack pouches and then hands another to Trisha, who has come to stand beside him.

"Oh. My. God!" Trish exclaims. "Where did you get this?"

"I traded Raul for it. The search party got a cut of all the storage food they looted from the pirates."

"Are there more of these in the pantry?" Candy asks.

"Probably. Ninety percent of the loot went to the communal pantry. The council hasn't decided quite how to ration it yet. There's a lot, but not enough of any one thing for everyone."

"They could always ration it through the tavern," Linda says as she shakes a silver mixer. "We could price according to demand."

"Well," Carol says, "it's got a thirty-year shelf life, so we'll probably hold onto it as emergency stores until we hit a drought or experience a very bad winter. That's what I'll be proposing anyway."

"Kill joy," Candy mutters.

"I don't get one?" Linda asks. She unscrews the top of the mixer and pours the concoction into a martin glass and pushes it to Carol.

"I got you something else." Gunther slides out the chess set. "Hand carved, by the Kingdom's old master carpenter."

Carol takes a sip of her Manhattan and her eyes widen. It's strong.

Linda opens the chess set and picks up one of the pieces. "The detail is amazing on this! What did it cost you?"

"Now that's rude to ask," Gunther tells her.

"I know. I'm just surprised. It's not as if I'm your girlfriend, though not for lack of trying."

"You're my oldest and dearest friend in this world, though," Gunther tells her. "I don't want you to ever forget that."

"That's sweet of you." Linda sets the piece down and closes the chess set. "Which is why it's going to be so hard for me to tell you this."

"Tell me what?"

"You snooze, you lose."

Gunther sets his backpack on the floor. "Say what now?"

Candy and Trisha read the directions on their brownie pouches and get a pair of scissors to open them.

"I'm off the market," Linda tells him.

" _You're_ off the market?" Gunther asks. "You yourself?"

Carol chuckles and takes another sip of her drink. It's sharp, but she likes it.

"That's right, handsome." Linda snaps her fingers. "I got snatched up."

"I'm gone eight days and you find yourself a boyfriend?" Gunther asks skeptically. He looks at Candy and Trisha. "Who?" They're too busy stuffing their faces with brownies to answer.

"Ernesto," Linda answers

"Ernesto? _My_ boss? The farm manager?"

"That's right. The big man himself. You didn't think I could do as good as you, and I did better."

"He's far too old for you!" Gunther insists.

"He's only _five_ years older than me. He's had a year to mourn Alicia. He's ready to move on now."

"I thought he was pushing _eighty_."

"He's only seventy!" Linda exclaims. "And he's in _great_ shape for his age."

"Could have fooled me," Gunther mutters. "He does very little of the actual, physical work. He mostly does paperwork, scheduling, supply inventory, resolving conflicts with the workers, that sort of thing. I'm the one _in_ the field getting my hands dirty."

That sounds a little like what Linda does at the tavern, Carol thinks as she lifts her Manhattan, which she's starting to like better with each passing sip.

"I told you he'd be jealous," Linda tells the waitresses as they lick their fingers clean of brownie crumbs.

Gunther shakes his head. "Do you really like him?"

"You don't think well of him?" Linda asks, no longer sounding gloating but honestly concerned.

"He's a good boss. He's fair. He's honest. And he's sharp. You could do a lot worse."

"Well I'm glad to have your approval."

"I just want you to be happy," Gunther assures her. "But do you think he can keep up with you?"

"Keep up with me?" Linda asks.

"He means in the sex department," Candy tells her.

"Oh, Gunther, honey, it's been so long since I last did that, I don't even really care about it anymore. If he's in the mood, I'm game, and if not, that's fine, too. Mostly I just want someone to cuddle with. To kiss on. To hold my hand at the movies and compliment me. And he's much better at chess than you are."

"I know. That's why I never play him anymore." Gunther pushes aside the water glass Linda gave him. " _We're_ still playing chess, though, aren't we?"

"I'm sure I can squeeze you in. But Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays, I'm going to let Trisha and Candy try handling the place alone in the evening. Those are our low crowd days. And I'm going to be at Ernesto's hut from dinner until closing."

"This sounds like it's moving _very_ quickly."

"Well we're not getting married tomorrow," Linda assures him. "And I can't possibly move in with him. God knows I'm not leaving this tavern unattended all night with only _Candy_ sleeping here."

"Hey, I resent that," Candy says. "I'm no thief. I never drink the inventory without paying."

"I'm more concerned you'll keep _company_ here at night."

Candy rolls her eyes. "I'm perfectly capable of finding other locations to keep company."

Carol finishes her Manhattan and leaves Gunther and his girls chatting to head back to her cabin. She's feeling the slightest bit lightheaded when she gets inside and finds Daryl asleep on the couch, with Sweetheart on her stomach on his chest, her fist half in her mouth, sleeping, too. She wishes she had a camera.


	144. Chapter 144

Carol has a hard time handing over Sweetheart to Shannon the next morning because the baby cries, "Mama, mama!"

"I'm coming back soon," Carol assures her, but Sweetheart says, "No! no! no!"

Shannon manages to distract the baby, and Carol slips out feeling guilty and heartbroken.

When she reports for patrol duty, Sheriff Earl hands her the notebook. "Anything interesting while I was gone?"

"Barry's girl and her boyfriend Jackson broke into the distillery and got drunk on the brew."

"Huh. Barry didn't mention that at our council meeting yesterday."

"He's embarrassed," Earl says. "And he knows it's probably going to hurt his chances of getting re-elected to the council next year. Even the good old boys won't vote for him this time around. They take theft very seriously here. Especially theft of their _beer_."

"What happened to the teenagers?"

"The court sentenced them to an extra ten hours a week until they repay the cost of the beer three-fold, and of course they have a first strike against them."

After three strikes, banishment is a possibility. It's a harsh penalty, but the unrepentant thief is a real danger to a community that lives on rations. "And how are you, Earl?"

"I keep on keeping on." He takes his deputy's hat off and scratches his head. "Ana was really broken up by the captain's death. I wonder if she'd cry that much at _my_ funeral."

"I'm sure she would," Carol tells him gently as she slips the notebook into her front pocket.

"I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I can…" Earl shakes his head.

"You don't _have_ to, you know."

The sheriff slips his hat back on. "Whether or not I'm actually the father, I'm the _only_ daddy that baby's gonna have now."

"I hope things work out for the best, Earl, one way or the other."

He nods. "I appreciate that."

Carol's rounds are an uneventful four hours, and then she has a late lunch with Shannon and Sweetheart. Fortunately, Daryl knocks on the door about the time she has to leave for her council meeting. Sweetheart points and cries "Dada!" when Shannon lets him in, which makes him grin ear to ear.

"How was the hunt?" Carol asks.

"Got us a five-point buck," he says.

Carol congratulates him and kisses him quickly on her way out the door.

[*]

"You're late, Commander," Garland says when James Witherspoon arrives, the last to join them at the council table, three minutes behind Carol. Witherspoon apologizes as he pulls out his chair.

"Commander?" Carol asks.

"McBride submitted his new list of officers," Garland explains. "Lawson has been demoted to lieutenant-commander, and Witherspoon has jumped up the ranks to commander. Carlos Alvarado was promoted to lieutenant, and Donnie O'Dell to junior lieutenant. And Harry Merriweather is an ensign now."

"Congratulations," Carol tells Witherspoon, who thanks her.

A stack of folders rests before Garland, and he opens one. "First order of business – two of the girls in the orphanage have turned thirteen this month and need to work for their own rations from now on. If the council approves, I'd like to put them on laundry duty." Sheets may be turned in to be washed once a month in the machines, and the orphan's clothes are also washed in the machines, but otherwise everyone does his or her own laundry in the river to save on electricity and hot water.

"Isn't that what Dwight and Sherry are doing?" Carol asks.

"They're in good health now. They have their strength back. We can put them to better use," Garland says.

"Fields!" Gunther cries at the same time Inola cries "Building!"

Inola turns to Gunther. "You know I need this dorm finished by January! And December isn't a harvest month. Come on."

"Then give them to me in January for the planting."

"I'm sure repairs will come up in January. The tenants will start to notice things."

"Fine," Gunther says. "I'll take them in February."

"Do Dwight and Sherry even _have_ skills in farming or building?" Thomas asks.

Garland slides out another file and opens it to review his notes. "Dwight has experience with woodcarving. He was in construction before the Great Sickness. He helped build some things in his camp in Williamsburg and at his camp in the…uh…Sanctuary."

"See!" Inola exclaims. "He should be mine permanently."

"Well, keep him until March and then let's re-evaluate," Gunther suggests.

"And Sherry?" Commander Witherspoon asks.

Garland switches folders. "Sherry doesn't mention any farming or building experience on her citizenship application." Sherry and Dwight both became full citizens in October. "She was a babysitter before the Great Sickness. She seems to have run a small in-home daycare of sorts. She also did childcare at Williamsburg. For her time at the Sanctuary, she just writes…wife?" He looks up from the folder. "Carol, do you know what sort of work she did? Cooking, laundry, cleaning, gardening? Or all of it?"

"Negan's wives didn't do any work."

"His wives?" Barry asks. "Plural?"

"He had a harem. The wives didn't work, except to serve him, and he supported them."

"Like a whorehut?" Thomas asks. "For just one man?"

"Not exactly," Carol answers. "The women didn't have the same level of freedom. They couldn't take another reasonable job if they wanted to. He threatened to assign them and their family members to dangerous work or banish them if they didn't agree to be his wives. Sherry agreed to protect her sister and Dwight. And herself."

"Christ," Barry mutters. "I'd murder the bastard if he tried to take my wife."

Carol doubts very much Barry would have, but she doesn't want to prolong the conversation. "Don't talk about this outside of this meeting. Sherry doesn't need the gossip."

"And that's an order," Garland echoes Carol. "All council business stays in the council room, understood? Barry?"

"Understood. Why single out me?"

"So Sherry has no experience except childcare," says Carolyn.

"Well, we've talked about opening a drop-in daycare," Carol says, "starting at six months, for the infants and toddlers who aren't in the preschool yet, so the parents can work more. If we did that, we'd need someone to run it. We should finally take a vote on that."

"All in favor of opening a day care and assigning Sherry to run it?" Garland asks.

Seven of the nine hands go up. Barry and Dr. Ahmad are the hold outs. Barry thinks it's not fair to pay Sherry full rations for work that only benefits a few parents of young children. Dr. Ahmad thinks babies shouldn't be separated from their mothers until weaned, and he doesn't think they should be weaned until they're thirty months and start preschool.

"The mothers could feed their own children before drop-off," Carol says. "Most people only work in three- to four-hour increments. They can drop-in to feed, too."

The council debates some more and eventually decides to open up a daycare, with Sherry serving as the caregiver, but with parents paying one extra hour of community labor for every fifteen hours they use the services. The daycare will be located in an old exhibit room of the museum that is currently unoccupied, so that Sherry and the little ones will have heat in the winter, be near running hot water, and have quick access to the infirmary in case of a problem. The council picks some workers to clean up the room and remove any dangerous exhibits as part of their twenty hours. Santiago and Sarah will be sent to scavenge for toys, cribs, and other useful items, and what they don't find, Dante will build.

Garland shuffles through the folders and opens another. "Kelly has applied to move in with her boyfriend Harry, and Anika's applied to move in with her boyfriend Adahy on a part-time basis. One of them would remain in the orphanage overnight every other day Sunday through Friday. They'd trade off Saturdays. They argue two of them aren't needed there now that two of the kids in there are of working age."

"Then they better do some other work," Carolyn says, "if they're only going to be there half-time now, and the older kids are helping. They aren't really doing twenty hours as is. They just put the kids to bed. Take them to the bathroom at night. Walk them to school in the morning. Most of their job is sleeping."

"They're each offering to work ten daytime hours, preferably in the greenhouses, but they'll consider the barns and the fields," Garland explains.

"Hallelujah!" Gunther exclaims. He holds a hand up. "All in favor? We can't deny these ladies more time with their lovers."

Carol chuckles and raises a hand.

Inola shakes her head. "Now you _really_ don't need Dwight." She raises her hand, as does everyone else.

"Can we assign rooms in the dorm now?" Inola asks. "Construction is on schedule to finish January 3. Maybe sooner with Dwight's help. We'll have twenty-four rooms. The four corner rooms are a bit larger and should be double occupancy."

Thomas, who serves as secretary for the council, writes the numbers 1-24 on a notepad and brackets off the first four to indicate the double occupancy rooms while Garland pulls out the applications and turns over one. "We'll start with the Kingdom women crowded in that museum room," Garland says. "Lauren has applied for a joint room with Derek from the barracks. They're getting married in December. Pencil them into a double, if there are no objections." Thomas does. "Put Joy and her daughter Faith in a double room. Then put the other three Kingdom women in singles, if there are no objections."

"That's five Kingdom women," Commander Witherspoon says. "Weren't there six in that room?"

"If Raul gets a room," Carol explains, "Sarah's planning to move in with Santiago."

"In that case," Garland says, "Let's give Raul a room."

Thomas pencils him into a single room, muttering, "Lucky dog."

"You'll probably get a room, too," Carolyn assures him.

"I mean for getting Sarah. She's beautiful."

"I thought you scored at Oceanside," Barry says.

"It's not like I'm going to see her until May. If I even make it on the trade ship. And she might not be interested by then."

"Dwight and Sherry applied," says Garland with a _let's-move-on_ tone in his voice. "They're in sleeping bags in the laundry room. Let's give them a double and get them out." The pencil rasps across the pad. "Juan's applied. It's crowded in that old whorehut with two couples and him, and I bet he does feel out of place. Let's give him a single." Thomas writes down his name. "That leaves sixteen applications from the barracks. Steve and Sean are brothers, so let's put them in a double to start." Thomas's pencil flies. "Put yourself and Gunther and the other twelve barracks men in singles and then tell me what we have left."

Thomas scrawls quickly and, when he's finished, says, "That leaves only one single."

As Garland spreads out the remaining applications, Carol counts three. So close, but two people will have to be told no.

"There's Donnie," Garland says, "Mitch's roommate, who wants his own place. Adhay's roommate Joseph also wants his own place, especially since Kelly will be moving into his hut part-time. And the third application is…huh. Candy."

"No," Gunther says adamantly. "Absolutely not. We are not giving her her own room in a dorm full of single men from the barracks. She's better off in the tavern's loft with Linda. There's plenty of room there since Trisha moved out. She already has her own large room."

"All in favor of denying Candy's application?" Garland asks. All nine hands go up.

Garland flips Candy's application into a reject pile. "So that means either Donnie or Joseph gets the last room."

"Captain McBride moved into Captain Cummins' old cabin on the _Susan Constant_ ," Witherspoon says, "which vacated the second, smaller officer's cabin on that ship. Donnie can have that if he wants it, now that he's a junior lieutenant. He probably wasn't expecting that when he applied for the dorm."

"Then let him take that and give Joseph the apartment," Garland says. Thomas pencils in the last name on the apartment list. "Read it over."

Thomas does, and then the council votes to approve the assignments.

"Gotta love Garland's Germany efficiency," Gunther says.

"I don't think Barron is a German name," Carol replies. "But I appreciate it, too."

They all leave the meeting with a sense of accomplishment.

[*]

New Jamestown doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, but it celebrates Founding Day on the third Tuesday in November, which marks the day the last plank in its defensive fence was hammered into the ground and its very first charter was signed by the naval officers. That's not the charter they live under anymore – that old charter was replaced after the mutiny - but they still honor the tradition of the town's founding.

A buffet is served from the tavern's bar, which is empty inside except for the cooks and servers and the people waiting in line for food, because all the seating is outside today. Picnic tables, card tables, and cafeteria tables cover the earth in the front and back of the tavern, with bonfires blazing for warmth. Some people have taken their plates to rocking chairs in front of individual huts and firepits. Carol knows Jamestown is big, but it's not until almost everyone is gathered in one section of the town for funerals and feasts that she's reminded just _how_ big.

The meal is wild turkey and chicken. Jamestown slaughters a few of its older hens annually for the occasion, the ones that have slowed or stopped their egg production. The buffet also contains steaming pans of mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes (received in trade with the Hilltop at the fair), and green beans. There's cranberry sauce and even pumpkin pie for dessert. Carol hasn't seen a meal like it in a very long time.

While Daryl watches Sweetheart and their food at a table outside, Carol goes to the "drink end" of the bar to exchange their "drink tickets" for two free pints of beer. As Linda draws her beer, Carol's surrounded on the left by Trisha and on the right by Candy.

"Spill it," Candy insists. "We've heard a rumor Gunther found a woman at Oceanside, but he won't tell us a _thing_."

"We just know her name's Dianne," Trisha says.

"And that she used to be a knight in your Kingdom," Linda adds as she slides one full pint across the bar to Carol.

"Well…I think that's not really my business to talk about," Carol says.

"Did they have sex?" Candy wants to know. "He wouldn't say."

"Probably because that's his private business," Carol suggests.

"I just want to know _one_ thing." Linda sets down the second full pint. "Is she smart and well read? Because I know Gunther, and I know it's not going to work if she doesn't keep his mind engaged. He may just be a farm boy from southern Virginia, but he's self-educated. The man reads more than you'd ever guess."

"Dianne's intelligent," Carol replies. "I don't know anything about her reading habits."

"Is she still fertile, do you know?" Trisha asks. "How old is she?"

"Good question!" Candy exclaims. "I mean, if they did have sex, I sure hope he wrapped it!"

"Wrapped it with what?" Trisha asks.

"You know…I really need to be getting back to Daryl and the baby." Carol takes the pint glasses and gives them the slip.

She's surprised to find Daryl talking to Dwight. Sweetheart stands between Daryl's legs underneath the picnic table, supporting herself by the bench, half her body beneath the table, but her head outside of it.

Dwight stops talking and nods. "Hey, Carol. It's good to see the baby's in good hands." He smiles and waves at Sweetheart, who looks at him curiously, as if she only vaguely recognizes him, even though he traveled with her parents for the first six or seven months of her life. Perhaps she has no memory of that difficult time. "John and Alexandra would be grateful to you both." Dwight turns and walks to another table.

"What were you two talking about?" Carol asks as she sets Daryl's pint in front of him and sits down across from him.

"Dwight's gonna help me make ethanol."

"Really? I thought you avoided him."

"Most of the time. Knows what he's doin', though, when it comes to that, 'n I could use the help. And he ain't askin' me to pay 'em."

"You think he feels guilty about what he did?"

Daryl shrugs. "Don't matter. Feelin' guilty ain't gonna bring no one back."

Carol watches Dwight sit down across from Sherry at a table with Raul, Santiago, and Sarah. They've made friends, it seems, though they knew Raul from Williamsburg.

"Mind if we join you?" Shannon asks as she sets down a plate next to Carol. Carol helps her by taking VanDaryl off her hands while she settles in, and Garland sits next to Daryl. Gary crawls under the table and over to Sweetheart and hugs her from behind.

"No!" Sweetheart yells.

"It's just me, silly!" Gary says.

Recognizing the voice, Sweetheart turns around and falls to her bottom at Daryl's feet. She bounces and squeals and reaches for Gary, who gives her another hug, which causes them both to wobble.

"Careful, Gary!" Garland warns him. "We don't want you rolling over on top of Sweetheart."

"Not for another seventeen years anyway," Shannon says, and then she bursts out laughing at Daryl's sour expression.


	145. Chapter 145

Carol has written a fifth word in Sweetheart's list of words in the _My First Year_ book – "hot." Daryl has installed a grate to keep her out of the fireplace, but she still tries to pull up on the iron bars from time to time. She grips them now, lets go, and cries, "Hot!" though she says it more like _ought_!

"Yeah, hot," Daryl tells her from where he sits in the armchair fiddling with his crossbow. "Told ya so a hundred times."

"You'd think she'd _learn_ by now," Carols says. "Why does she keep doing it?"

"'Cause it ain't hurtin' her 'nuff. Them bars're ain't _that_ hot. When she gets a first-degree burn, that'll learn 'er."

"Well I don't want her to learn that way!" Carol insists.

Daryl shrugs. "Some people gotta learn that way."

"Yeah, you say that now, but the first time she's _really_ hurt, you're going to be a big puddle on the floor."

He stands and swings his bow on his back. "'M goin' down to the armory to use the bow press 'fore it closes."

"You better hurry. It's almost seven."

"Open 'til eight now. That new gunsmith works late." He runs a hand over the top of Sweetheart's head as he passes her. When his hand is on the door handle, he says, "After that, might stop by the tavern 'n play some cards with the boys."

By the boys, he means Gunther, Raul, and Mitch. "This is your third time playing with them since we got back from Oceanside." And they've only been back a week and a half.

"Don't nag. Garland's gonna be there tonight. He never gets out."

"I wasn't nagging." Carol ties off the thread. "I think it's a good thing for you." It's also good for Gunther, who could use more friends than a bartender and two waitresses, and for Raul, who finally seems relaxed around men. "But _I'd_ like to get out some night, too." Ed was always going out. She was always expected to stay home with Sophia. Ed was controlling, but she also _let_ herself fall into that pattern.

"A'ight. Then get out. Hell's the problem?"

"Well, we have to coordinate, Daryl." She nods to Sweetheart. "We have a baby. If _you're_ not here, I _have_ to be. That's how that works."

"When ya wanna get out?"

"Saturday? Maybe I'll go to the movies with Shannon."

"A'right. Marked m' calendar." He makes a check mark in the air with his finger, and Carol smiles.

[*]

Daryl rolls the whiskey on his tongue before swallowing. "Raise ya ten." He sets the glass down and tosses in a chip.

"I'm out." Gunther turns his cards over. He glances over to the bar where Ernesto is sitting and talking to Linda as she stands mixing a drink on the other side. "She really does look happy. And I never would have thought to fix those two up."

"Well I guess you'll have to turn in your matchmaker card then." Mitch tosses in a chip to meet Daryl's bet.

Raul folds, but Garland tosses in a chip and says, "I've got a full house. Read 'em and weep."

"Shit," Mitch mutters and throws down his hand, followed by Raul. But Daryl's got four of a kind, and the pot. He slides the chips to himself and begins to stack them by color.

Garland shuffles and deals. "Five card draw this time."

"So I take it you don't hate me anymore for letting the cat out of the bag?" Gunther asks Mitch.

"It wasn't your place," Mitch tells him as he picks up his hand. "But I suppose maybe I should thank you for giving James a swift kick in the pants."

Gunther slides his cards to himself. "Good to know. Because I have a favor to ask of you."

"What's that?" Mitch asks cautiously.

"Could I have your hut when Dianne is in town? They're coming next Thursday afternoon, and they're leaving Sunday morning. It would just be three nights. I know your roommate moved out, got his own cabin on one of the ships now that he's been promoted."

"But _I_ didn't move out."

"You could stay with Witherspoon in his ship's cabin. That's allowed, isn't it? When he's not sailing?"

"It's _allowed_ ," Mitch agrees, "but it's crowded."

"Aren't there two bunks in there?"

"Two bunks and a desk and dresser and about two feet to turn around."

"What if I buy your next beer?" Gunther asks.

"Make it this one," Mitch holds up his mug, " _and_ the next one."

"Sold."

"I wish Enid was coming with them," Raul mutters.

"Who's Enid?" Garland asks.

"She's this woman from the Hilltop," Raul tells him. "She's about my age. A little older. Really nice. And smart. She's their doctor."

"Are you two dating?" Garland asks as he hands three cards to Daryl, who has discarded three.

"No." Raul lays down two cards. "I mean…she didn't say we were. But she said she's looking forward to seeing me again in May."

"In this world, young man," Gunther tells him, "you take what you can get."

"That's not the attitude you had on the ship ride to Oceanside," Mitch points out. "You seemed to think it was better not to want anything at all."

"I _don't_ want anything," Gunther says. "I've just decided to take what comes my way."

"Mhmh," Mitch murmurs. "You don't want anything. That's why you want my hut when Dianne's in town. Because you have no hopes whatsoever."

"I'm glad you understand me." Gunther slides his cards together and puts them face down on the table. "I fold."

"Ya always fold," Daryl tells him. "Ain't ya got any balls at all?"

"I'm just realistic about my limitations."

"Another round of drinks, boys?" Candy asks as she stops by their table.

"No thank you," Garland says. "Shannon would kill me if I spent anymore ammo than I already have tonight. I'm just lucky we aren't playing for real money. Daryl would have cleaned me out."

"Oh now, honey, you've _earned_ that ammo. You _deserve_ another drink. And I deserve a big tip for bringing it to you."

"Kids aren't cheap," Garland tells her. "Nothing for me."

"Water for me," Gunther says.

Candy sighs.

"I'll have another pint of Jamestown brew, on Gunther's tab." Mitch hands her his empty pint glass.

"You can do better than that, sweetheart," Candy tells him. "You got that finder's fee for the pirates ammo. Upgrade to some hard liquor. It's only one round of ammo more."

"I prefer beer."

Candy shakes her head. "This table is not going to be worth my effort tonight. I can already tell that."

"'Nother whiskey, neat," Daryl says.

Candy snatches up his glass. "Well thank God at least one of you has some taste."

"That's your third," Garland observes as Candy heads toward the bar. "You're not going to get in trouble with Carol for spending all that ammo?"

"'S _my_ ammo. She's got 'er own. Do with mine whatever the hell I want."

"My ex-wife never thought that way," Gunther says. "What was mine was hers. And what was hers was also hers."

"What's ours is ours," Garland says. "And we like to conserve. Extra ammo means we can buy extra milk for Gary. VanDaryl will be on solids soon. I'm trying not to work so many hours so I can spend time with the family and still occasionally get out like this. You gentlemen don't know how much I've needed this evening." He slides his cards together. "But I fold. And I'm headed home. Thanks for the game." His chair scrapes back and he tosses the cards face-down on the table.

"Still an hour 'til closin'," Daryl tells him.

"I know, but the boys are probably asleep by now. And Shannon will probably go to sleep in half an hour if I'm not home."

"So?" Raul asks.

"So…opportunity knocks."

"Means he thinks he's gettin' laid," Daryl says, and Raul flushes.

"We'll be there for Sweetheart's birthday party, though," Garland promises.

Daryl nods.

When Garland's gone, they finish up the hand, which Raul wins this time. He gathers the chips with a huge, boyish grin. Dante comes over from the bar and asks, "Can I join you?"

Gunther waves to the chair, which Dante takes, and Raul calls the game and deals him in.

"Where's Inola?" Gunther asks. "You're out alone tonight?"

Dante grins. "Well…she's been tired lately. Because…uh…" He leans forward as he scoops up his cards. "Come about July, there's going be a little Dante, Jr. in the household. But we're not telling anyone yet. So you didn't hear it from me."

"What if 's a girl?" Daryl asks him.

"Well, that's not the actual _name_ ," Dante insists. "We haven't talked names yet. Inola doesn't want to until she's made it six months."

"Good thing Carol talked the Council into that daycare," Gunther says. "There must be something in the water."

Candy returns with their drinks. "What do you want, Dante, honey?"

"Get me a Captain John Smith."

"What's that?" Mitch asks.

"A cocktail Linda invented," Gunther tells him.

"I've heard it's to die for," Dante says.

Candy puts a hand on her hip. "It's five rounds of ammo."

"Oh. _That_ much?" Dante asks. "Nevermind."

Maybe it's the two whiskies he's already had, and the third one he's sipping, but Daryl feels generous. "Put it on my tab," he says. "Man deserves it. 'S 'bout to be a daddy."

"Is that so?" Candy asks with a raised eyebrow.

Dante slowly closes his eyes. "Now everyone will know by tomorrow and Inola will kill me for blabbing."

"Oh…" Daryl murmurs. "Sorry, man." He looks up at Candy. "Better make that a double Cap'n John Smith."

[*]

When Daryl comes home, after all the chairs were put up except theirs, and he and the boys were told the tavern had closed ten minutes ago, he's a bit drunk. He crawls into bed with Carol and wakes her up with a gentle squeeze of her breast. At least he thinks it's gentle until she says _Ow!_ and swats his hand away. "Sorry," he murmurs. "Wanna fuck? I wanna fuck."

"Well as romantic as that proposal is, I'm going to decline." She scoots away from him.

He puts an arm around her waist and yanks her back until her ass hits his crotch. "We should fuck. I wanna fuck."

"I'm not in the mood," she says more sternly this time, and inches away again.

"Ya mad?"

"I'm about to be."

"So I should just go to sleep then?" he asks.

"That would be advisable."

"Mhmhm." He rolls over onto his back. "Love ya."

He's not sure if she says it back, because he falls asleep. In the morning, she's at the breakfast table, drinking instant coffee while Sweetheart writes in oatmeal on the table of her highchair. Rubbing his head, Daryl grabs a cup from the hutch, puts some instant coffee crystals in the bottom, and pours the hot water on top.

"How much did you drink last night?" she asks.

"Not that much," he insists as he sits down across from her and sips the bitter coffee. He waits for her to nag him, to say something more, but she doesn't. He's not sure if it's because she's not mad, or because she's secretly stewing, so he ventures some conversation. "Garland says they'll come for Sweetheart's birthday party."

"Good. I'd like to make her a cake. I know it's silly. It's her first birthday. She'll just smear the icing on her face. But the rest of us could eat it."

"Sounds good."

"I'm going to need to use some ammo to bargain for the sugar and flour, though. We don't get enough in our rations. I think eight rounds should do it. Can you chip in half? Or did you spend all your finder's fee at the tavern?"

Ah. There it is. "Didn't spend it _all_!" But then he does the math in his head. They each got twenty-seven rounds from the stash they found at the pirate's campground. Three whiskeys at three rounds each, five for Dante's drink, six for those two pints of beer he had after the whiskies…and shit. That's 23, and he left Candy the four rounds he had on him for a tip. That _is_ all of his finder's fee.

"Uh oh." Sweetheart says. "Uh-oh. Dada. Uh-oh."

Daryl looks over and sees she's knocked over her sippy cup. He sets it up. "Got plenty of ammo." And he does. Before the pirates, he already had seventy rounds of ammo saved up from his weekly rations and his other scavenging. He always hunts with his bow and, unlike Carol, he rarely does target practice with firearms. Of course, he traded away about twenty of those at the fair. But that still leaves fifty rounds. He's a rich man. "I'll pay for it. All of it."

"I didn't ask you to pay for all of it."

"Ain't a problem. Pay for it all." He picks up his coffee and peers at Carol over it. "We ain't fightin' are we?"

"You wouldn't notice if we were?"

"Uh-oh. Dada. Uh-oh."

Daryl glances at Sweetheart, but she doesn't seem to have knocked anything over this time, so he returns his attention to Carol. "Dunno sometimes. Ya seem mad but not mad."

"I'm keeping things in perspective."

"Mhmhm." Daryl raises his coffee to his lips and sips. "'S mean, perspective?"

"It means I can see the wheels turning in your mind, and I'm guessing you'll come to the proper conclusion."

"'N what's that?"

She smiles slightly and finishes her last sip of coffee. "I need to get Sweetheart cleaned up and drop her at Shannon's before I start my patrol rounds." She stands and wipes the baby's hands and face with a cloth before releasing the table on the highchair.

"Uh-oh," Sweetheart says as Carol takes her out of the chair. "Uh-oh, Dada, uh-oh."

[*]

Mitch and Daryl don't bother to reset the branches on the bear trap. This is probably the last one they'll catch before the colder weather drives them into their dens, and it's amazing this one was still out and about. It's a big one, and they had to drag it out with a lot of heaving and heel digging.

"So…did you make it home without incident last night?" Mitch asks as they field dress the animal together.

"'Course I did. Hell kind of incident would I of had?"

"You were pretty drunk. How'd Carol like that?"

"She didn't," Daryl admits. "But she ain't a nag neither. Got m'self a good woman."

"You sure do. You're a lucky man."

"Yeah," Daryl says quietly. "Yeah, guess I am."

[*]

It seems like every day there's a council meeting. Today it's an open town hall. Somebody wants to complain about the noise from the dorm construction, so Inola agrees the workers will start an hour later in the morning and go an hour later in the evening instead. Another citizen proposes the finder's fee for scavenging be increased to ten percent per person, instead of ten percent per group, up to a maximum of forty percent of the find. The council says it will consider the proposal in a closed-door meeting. A third citizen applies for a job reassignment because she's pregnant.

"Whole lot of babies coming our way," Dr. Ahmad says, and a whole bunch of people look straight at Inola.

She shakes her head. "Dante can't keep his mouth shut, can he?"

"He's just proud," Gunther tells her. "At least he's not having a heart attack over it."

Carol stays to chat with Garland for a moment while the citizens and other council members clear out. When he goes back to his office, she heads outside the museum and finds Daryl waiting for her. He's got his motorcycle, and he's wearing a black leather jacket he picked up from one of the pirate cabins. He's leaned back against the bike, his arms crossed over his chest.

She strolls toward him. She's still a little ticked off about last night, but she knows he's not a man who can be told what to do, and she probably wouldn't like it if he was. She also knows he loves her, and that he'll be looking for ways to show her that, especially if she doesn't put him on the defensive.

"Hey," he says. "Wanna ride home?"

She smiles lightly. "I could use a ride."

Daryl stands straight and waves her toward the bike. He straddles it and waits for her to climb on behind him. "It's been a long time since we've done this," she says as she slides her arms around him.

The roar of the engine sends a thrill tingling up her spine when he kick starts the bike. She presses herself to his back and inhales the crisp scent of leather as he takes off past the sea of flags. She buries her face against his muscular shoulder to hide it from the late November wind as he flies over the docks and leans right to weave weave up the dirt path that leads to their cabin. He doesn't take her home right away. He flies through the Indian Village, circles around the tavern at the far end, and then roars back to the settlement again.

Her heart's thudding by the time he purrs to a stop outside their intricately carved front door. She slides off, cheeks warm from the small adventure.

"Listen…uh…'" Daryl dismounts, steps forward, and puts a hand hesitantly on her hip. "M sorry. For the way I acted last night. Ain't gonna happen again. Mean, m' still goin' out with the boys from time to time. Just ain't gonna get so drunk or waste so much damn ammo."

Carol kisses his cheek. "Good to know. Would you go pick up Sweetheart from the Barron cabin while I get dinner started?"

"Mhmhm," murmurs Daryl, looking relieved. "Sure."


	146. Chapter 146

Garland suggests Daryl bring Sweetheart over while the women are out on Saturday night. VanDaryl is up on all fours and rocking before the fireplace, but he's not going anywhere. Sweetheart crawls circles around him as if to show him how it's done, while Gary plays tug-of-war with an old rag with Dog.

"How's the ethanol coming along?" Garland asks as he hands Daryl a glass of iced tea.

"Got three gallons so far." Daryl sinks down in the armchair. "So I guess Jamestown gets two of those."

"That's the deal for the corn." Garland sits in the rocking chair and rests his foot on his knee.

"Dwight's been helpin' me."

"And you haven't killed him yet? I appreciate your restraint."

"Ain't like we're buddies now. Just makin' ethanol together."

"You know, that bike might come in handy as an emergency vehicle," Garland says. "Getting people from the settlement and the village to the infirmary, or getting a doctor up to them."

"Council ain't takin' m' bike."

"I didn't say we'd _take_ it. But in an emergency, you'd let it be used for that, wouldn't you?"

"'Course. But then I should get two-thirds of the ethanol me and Dwight make."

"The _community_ supplies the corn," Garland reasons. "But I'll see if the council will agree to give you fifty percent, on condition that your bike serve as an emergency vehicle if and when needed."

VanDaryl and Sweetheart are sitting up now. VanDaryl drops the block the older baby tries to hand him, and she says, "Uh oh." VanDaryl smiles mischievously.

"What movie they watchin'?" Daryl asks.

"They're showing _Dirty Dancing_."

"Thought they showed that already." Jamestown has a huge library of looted DVDs, and with only three different movies a week playing in that theater, they don't do repeats.

"That was _Ghost_. Also Patrick Swayze."

"Fuck is it with the Patrick Swayze movies?"

"Uh oh, Dada. Uh oh."

"She doesn't like your language," Garland says. "Fine little lady you're raising there. You treat her with respect VanDaryl, you hear?" VanDaryl turns at the sound of his father's voice, gets on all fours, and rocks as if ready to launch toward him. "Come on now," Garland tells him, "Crawl to daddy." VanDaryl puts one hand forward, then one knee, and then falls flat on his face.

The little boy lifts his head, looking dazed, and his lip trembles. Before he can start crying, Garland scoops him up and sets him on his lap in the rocking chair. Sweetheart, having had her playmate snatched from her, decides to crawl over to Daryl and pull herself up on his knee. She reaches from the arm of the chair, inches along it, and then walks three steps alone toward Gary and Dog in the foyer. She takes a tumble, says "Uh oh," and then crawls the rest of the way toward them, where she sits up. She bounces on her bottom and claps her little hands as she watches them fight over the rag.

"Grrrrr!" Gary growls at Dog as he tugs, and Dog growls back.

"Patrick Swayze," Daryl mutters. "Again?"

"Hey," Garland reasons. "They'll come home horny."

Carol _does_ come home horny, after Daryl is already back at their cabin and Sweetheart is sound asleep in her crib. Daryl's not sure if it's seeing Patrick Swayze, or all the dirty dancing, or having fun with Shannon, or just finally getting a night away from the baby, but he doesn't question it. He just helps her out of her clothes and lets her ride him hard in the armchair, their breaths a panting, echoed chorus, their smacking kisses like cymbals in between, until she reaches a groaning crescendo and buries her cry in the crook of his neck.

Later, when their curled naked together beneath the heavy down comforter, he murmurs against her back, "So ya ain't mad at me no more?"

She turns in his arms to face him. "Daryl, I'm not mad. It took two scoots and you were off me. But you know…that's not what it was like with Ed when he'd come home drunk. So…bad memories."

"Yeah." He strokes her cheek with his thumb. "Wanna give ya good memories."

"You have. And you will. You've given me hundreds. You'll give me hundreds more." She kisses him, and then presses her body closer to his. They make love a second time, slowly, as the fire fades in the living room and their bodies warm one another.

[*]

Carol lowers her binoculars and lets them dangle over her chest. She's standing on the dock, just beyond the last moored ship, so she can have an unobstructed view of the river. There's no speedboat in sight. The Oceanside contingent was planning to leave at sunrise, which, depending on their speed and any obstacles they might encounter, would likely put them here sometime between 12:30 PM and 3:00 PM. It's 2:45 PM now.

She strolls halfway down the dock, veers into the grass, and sits down at a picnic table. She looks over to one of the new dockside plots where Gunther appears to be busy planting onions, garlic, and winter lettuce, except she knows he's finished by now and has just been massaging the earth for the past half hour. "Stop pretending you aren't waiting for Dianne and come hang out with me," she calls.

Gunther stands and wipes his palms down the front of his overalls, leaving streaks of dirt. Then he steps carefully out of the plot, strolls over, and sits down at the picnic bench across from her. He takes off his straw hat and lays it on the table. Then he looks down at the mess on his overalls. "Dammnit."

"She won't care. It's a dirty world. We're all dirty."

Gunther undoes one of the straps of his overalls so he can fold over the now filthy front.

"Well, don't let your pants fall off when you stand up," Carol teases. "You don't want to seem _too_ eager."

Gunther sighs, clicks the strap back into place, and gets up to walk over to the low stone wall where he draped his tan farm jacket. He must have gotten hot gardening. He slides into it and snaps it up and sits down again. Carol does think he looks better in the jacket, not because it's cleaner (though it is), but because she thinks overalls, however practical they may be for farming, look goofy.

"We aren't the only anxious ones," she says, and points to the deck of the _Susan Constant_. Captain McBride stands at the bow, looking through a telescope. He lowers it and then paces the deck.

"They should really be here by now, shouldn't they?" Gunther asks.

"It's not like the old world, where you could count on travel times. Maybe they got a late start, or met with floaters and had to steer around, or were running out of power and had to reduce speed to stay charged."

"Or the battery died and they're stranded out there," Gunther mutters. "Or they got waylaid by pirates."

"We cleared those men out, and we saw nothing else on that route there _or_ back," Carol insists. She's not sure is she's reassuring herself or Gunther. "Dianne is an excellent shot, and so is Cyndie."

"Cyndie's driving." Gunther drums his fingers on the table. Then he perks up and stares toward the lighthouse behind her. Carol turns to see what he's looking at. The guard in the light tower has begun waving the signal flag.

Carol leaps up and looks through her binoculars, but she can't see past the _Susan Constant_. She hurries to the end of the dock and looks again. There it is, in the distance, the speedboat, purring with an electric roar across the river, and flying the flag of the Alliance. She can make out Cyndie driving, and standing like a guard dog to her left, bow on her shoulder, Dianne. Sitting on the bench seats behind them are Henry and Rachel – and then, on the seat behind them, a fifth person. Enid.

[*]

Several sailors who didn't make the trip to Oceanside help the speedboat dock and tie it up quickly. They extend their hands to help the women step out and immediately start flirting with them once they climb onto the dock.

"Back off!" Captain McBride bellows as he thunders up behind them, having exited his perch on the _Susan Constant_. The sailors part like a wave for him. He stops in front of Cyndie and grins. "Hello."

"Hello," Cyndie replies. "We made it."

"Would you like to – "

"- Tour the ship?" she asks. "Not right away. Right now, you can help me unload the boat."

"Indeed." McBride steps on board the now empty speed boat and begins setting backpacks up on the dock.

Carol hugs Henry tightly, while Dianne kisses a relieved-looking Gunther on the cheek. Carol hugs her daughter-in-law next – not for long – she gets the idea Rachel isn't much of a hugger – and then Enid. "What brings you here?" she asks.

"We have a woman at the Hilltop with severe morning sickness," Enid says. "I remembered Raul mentioning an herbal remedy that worked well for them in Williamsburg, but I need him to teach me to make it. And I need one of the herbs. We don't have it. So I thought I'd hitch a ride and do some trading. Besides, it gives my apprentice another chance to practice working without my supervision. He relies too much on me when I'm around."

Carol smiles. "Raul will be happy to see you."

Cyndie picks up one of the packs McBride has tossed onto the dock and slides it on her back. Dianne picks up hers as well.

"We were getting worried about y'all," Gunther admits.

"Well," Henry says as he grabs Rachel's pack from the dock and hands it to her, "we found the wreckage of that speed boat you exploded, and we stopped to salvage a solar panel. There was one still intact, believe it or not. Then Rachel thought we should check out that campground to see if you missed anything the first time around."

"And did we?" Carol asks.

Henry grins and waves to the heavy green ammo canister McBride is heaving onto the dock. The captain slaps up another one, the muscles of his arms bulging as he lifts it. "You forgot to check the cabin's root cellars," Henry explains. "They were all empty but one, which had guns and ammo." As if to prove the point, McBride lays a semi-automatic rifle on the dock now.

"Those are ours," Cyndie tells McBride.

"You asked me to unload."

"I meant for you to unload the packs. We can keep those on the boat. We won't need them here, will we?"

McBride slides up two more guns. "We'll store them in our armory until you leave. Just to be safe. And you might want to use some of this ammo at the tavern or the movies while you're here. Hanson!" he yells to one of the sailors on the docks. "Get me a cart!"

"Aye, aye, Captain!"

McBride climbs out of the speedboat. "Quite the score."

"How much can we have for the tavern?" Henry asks.

"We're coming home with that ammo," Cyndie tells him.

"With most of it, yeah," Rachel says. "But we get _some,_ right? It was _my_ idea to double check."

Cyndie sighs. "Fine. Why don't you and Henry take forty rounds total. And Dianne and Enid, you take fifteen rounds each."

"They get more?" Dianne asks.

"It _was_ Rachel's idea."

Dianne shrugs, crouches down, and opens the lid of one of the ammo containers with a clang. Henry and Enid crouch beside her, and they start counting out their bullets and shoving them in their pockets.

"But remember what you spend here doesn't come _back_ with us," Cyndie reminds them. "It all goes back in their armory."

"Like a bank," McBride agrees. "In and out and all around and back again. But trust me. You'll have a good night with your cut at the tavern."

"Oh, no," Cyndie says as Dianne clangs shut the ammo canister and she and Enid and Henry stand, pockets heavy with ammo. " _You're_ buying, aren't you?"

"Well…" McBride waves his hand over the two metal cases. "You have a wee fortune there, lass. But I'll pay you back in dances."

Cyndie chuckles.

"Where's my baby sister?" Henry asks.

"At home. With Daryl," Carol replies.

Work boots trample over the docks toward them, and the footsteps slow. "Enid?" Raul's been at the dorm construction site on the other side of the museum and has come to a surprised stop on his way back to his cabin.

Enid smiles, and there's an awkward dance between them, as if they aren't sure whether to greet with a hug, a kiss, or a handshake. They settle on a hug. "I hitched a ride," she tells him. "I need herbs to make that morning sickness medicine you told me about."

They all begin walking toward the settlement together, except Cyndie, who is loading the guns and ammo onto a push cart a sailor has rolled over, with the help of Captain McBride, who tells her, "After we store these in our armory, I'll give you a tour of the museum."

"A _tour_?" Cyndie asks.

"An _actual_ tour. I'll show you the exhibits about our town."

"So, where are we all staying?" Enid asks as she walks beside Raul.

"Well, Henry and Rachel will stay in our cabin. You can have our bed," Carol tells the newlyweds. "I can take the couch and Daryl can take the floor."

"Oh, God, eww, no, Mom," Henry says. "We don't want your bed. Rachel can take the couch, and I'll take the floor."

"It's not as if Daryl and I haven't christened the couch and the floor, too," she tells him.

"Eww! Mom!"

"Dianne, you can stay in Mitch's hut," Gunther says. "He's staying with his boyfriend this weekend."

"And where are you staying?" Dianne asks with the barest hint of a smile on her face.

"Well, if you like, I thought perhaps I'd stay in Mitch's hut, too."

"I like. And I suppose Cyndie will end up sleeping on the _Susan Constant_. That just leaves, you Enid."

Enid looks at Raul, who looks down at the dock as they walk. "We have a couch," he tells his boots. "My dad and me. I mean, I'm going to have my own room in the dorm when it's done, but…for now… I live with him. In a cabin. And we have a couch."

"Oh…kay." Enid says. "Are you offering me your couch?"

"No!" Raul looks up. "You can sleep in my bed." He flushes. "I mean, not with me in the bed. With me on the couch. I mean, not _with me_ on couch. I mean I'd be on the couch and _you'd_ be in my bed."

Enid smiles. "Does your dad snore?"

"No. And I've put up curtains around my bed, so you'll have your privacy. If you don't want to, that's fine. I'm sure there's plenty of places we could find for you - "

"- It sounds fine. I'm not picky."

Raul smiles. "Okay." His smile fades. "But I really need to clean up first."

When they step on the dirt path and begin heading toward the settlement and village, Daryl is coming toward them, Sweetheart on his back. He was either getting worried waiting for them back at the cabin, or bored. Sweetheart squeals, "Mama mama mama!" when she sees Carol.

Henry grins and jogs up the path to meet his baby sister.


	147. Chapter 147

Henry lies sideways on the bear skin rug and stacks a big soft block on top of the two-block tower that rises in front of Sweetheart. "Three," he says.

Sweetheart leans forward and tries to grab the top block, and they all topple over. "Uh-oh!"

Henry chuckles. "It's okay. We'll fix it." He cranes his neck back to look at Carol, who has begun chopping the vegetables for dinner. "How many words does she say?"

"Five," Carol tells him, "Mama, dada, uh-oh, no, and hot."

"I wonder how many I said at her age." He looks back at Sweetheart. "Brother. Brother. I'm your brother. Say bruuuuh-th-er."

"I think that's going to be a mouthful for her, puppy," Rachel says.

" _Puppy_?" Daryl asks. He opens the Igloo cooler and pulls out four paper-wrapped venison steaks.

"It's not any worse than _your_ nickname," Henry assure him. "Brother," he repeats to the baby. "Brother. Bruuuuh-th-er."

"She can't say that!" Daryl mutters. He stacks the steaks in one hand, takes the six steps to the living room, and points down at Henry. "Bubba. Bubba."

"Bubba?" Henry asks. "Why should I have to be Bubba? Where'd you come up with that?"

"'S southern for brother."

"Bubba?" Henry asks doubtfully.

"It is," Carol agrees.

"Well I don't want to be Bubba. That's way too redneck. So don't call – "

"Buh – _buh_!" Sweetheart squeals and claps her hands.

Rachel laughs. "I guess you're Bubba now."

[*]

The venison steaks sizzle on the grill in back of the cabin. Dog licks his chops and whines. "Ain't for you." Daryl fishes in his front pocket and tosses the canine a bit of rabbit jerky. Dog catches it and then lies on his paws to gnaw on it.

Santiago wanders over from his cabin a few doors down, his brown felt deputy's hat shading his dark eyes and a hand-rolled cigar hanging out of the side of his mouth. He takes a puff and lowers the cigar to his side as he approaches. "Smells damn good. When's dinner?"

"Ain't for you."

"How'd you get four steaks? Rations were one per adult this week. Raul's giving half of his to Enid. And a third of mine."

"Mitch 'n me caught a deer off the clock, after we met our quota." That meant they got some extra rations of ammunition _and_ twenty percent of the meat, according to the council's new overtime rules for hunters. The rest went into the communal stores. He nods to Santiago's cigar. "Thought ya didn't smoke."

"Only these." Santiago lifts the cigar, and the smoke rises and curls and mingles with the smoke from the grill. "To mark special occasions. Madam Linda makes them. The tavern sells them, but they charge four rounds of ammo for just one. That's why I only smoke them on _special_ occasions." He extends it toward Daryl. "Want a puff?"

"Nah. Make me want a cigarette."

Santiago nods and draws the cigar back. He takes another puff. "You aren't going to ask me what the special occasion is?"

Daryl flips a steak. "'S the special occasion?"

Santiago smiles. "She said yes."

"Who said yes to what?" Daryl flips another steak.

"Sarah. She's going to marry me. Wedding's January 5th in the chapel, since Raul should be in the dorms by then. You and Carol are invited."

"Congrats." He doesn't want to sit through a wedding in the chapel. Jamestown's priest is a rambler. The rabbi's more to the point, but Santiago's probably not using the rabbi.

"Thanks. So what can you tell me about this girl? Enid?"

Daryl flips the third and fourth steaks. "Ain't much to tell."

"How old is she?"

"Dunno. Twenty-three maybe."

"Was she with you back when you were in Georgia?"

"Nah. She was at Alexandria when we got there. Teenager back then. One 'er own. Parents got ate up."

"And she's already a doctor at the Hilltop?" Santiago asks.

"Yeah. 'Nother doctor trained 'er when we were warrin' with the Saviors. She had to amputate my buddy Aaron's arm. First real gig."

"Damn. Talk about pressure." Santiago puffs out a ring of smoke.

"Hell ya askin' for?"

"It just seems Raul's hung up on her, so I was curious. He's been talking about her almost nonstop since he got back from Oceanside. Enid this. Enid that. It finally died down three or four days ago, and I thought he might let up, and then she shows up." Santiago shrugs. "And now she's staying in our cabin for the next three nights. I guess I better find a way to stay out late at night. Maybe switch with Andrew for night patrol."

Daryl presses the steaks one by one against the grill.

"Damn that smells good."

"Go eat yer own!"

"Yeah, yeah. But Carol seasoned yours somehow. Smells fantastic. You're a lucky man, living with a chef. I think Sarah's a worse cook than I am." Santiago wanders off.

[*]

Daryl takes Friday off for Sweetheart's big birthday bash. Carol has them all blowing up balloons she found in the storehouse, which he thinks is ridiculous (it's the goddamn apocalypse, not balloon time), but then Sweetheart gets so excited to see him bopping one in the air, that he changes his mind. He catches it on the down float and then hands it to her where she sits on the floor. The one-year-old immediately puts her mouth on it.

"Don't let her touch it!" Carol snatches the balloon away. "They'll pop, and she'll choke."

"Hell am I blowin' 'em up for if she can't play with 'em?" he asks.

"Decorations," Henry tells him. "Mom loves her decorations. Haven't you seen her at Christmas?"

"I'm going to line the mantle with them," Carol says.

"We should tack a couple on the door outside," Rachel suggests as she ties off a red balloon.

"That's a great idea," Carol tells her.

At least those two seem to be getting along today, Daryl thinks. Rachel was driving Carol crazy last night with her little comments about how she wouldn't let Henry do this or that the way Carol lets Daryl do this or that, until Carol finally barked, "Daryl is a grown ass man! I don't _let_ him do anything!" Henry tried to diffuse the situation, while Daryl opted to ignore it entirely, but things seem better today, maybe because both girls are equally excited about the birthday party. Rachel's probably never had a birthday party. Hell, none of them have.

Carol pulls something out of a carboard box. Shit. _Streamers_. Daryl doesn't want to hang those. "Gonna run down to the tavern," he says. "Get a growler of beer for the party."

"Do you need some ammo?"

"Nah. Earned extra this week." And, unlike Carol, he hasn't spent any of his regular rations practicing at the range.

"You're not going to make him help decorate?" Rachel asks.

Carol's eyes narrow, Henry gets a panicked look in his, and Daryl darts out the door.

[*]

The scent of venison and potato stew wafts from the cauldron over the fireplace. The tavern has just opened for lunch, so it's not yet crowded. Daryl waves to Mitch and Commander Witherspoon, who share a table in the corner near the stage where a piano, fiddle, and a guitar await tonight's live performance. Gunther and Dianne are eating lunch at the bar, and it looks like the poor woman is being grilled by the manager and waitresses. Dianne seems relieved when he interrupts the inquisition. "Need a growler."

"That'll be fifteen rounds," Linda tells him as she turns to grab and fill one. Meanwhile Trisha disappears to check on a young couple lunching at a table near the fireplace.

Daryl counts out the rounds on the bar while Candy asks Dianne, "So did you ever have any kids?"

"No. I never married."

"Oh, well, that didn't stop Trisha from having _two_ in the old world," Candy says.

"I heard that!" Trisha calls from the other side of the tavern.

"I'm just trying to figure out what you and Gunther have in _common_ ," Candy continues "You're not his usual type. You're so different from Megan."

Dianne turns to Gunther with a curious expression.

"Oh, shit, I'm sorry, Gunther!" Candy exclaims. "I – "

"- Oh," Dianne interrupts, "she must be the prostitute you told me about."

Candy lets out a sigh of relief. "You told her?"

"The first evening we spent together," Dianne replies.

"Why on earth would you do that?" Candy asks.

"We stayed up late talking and playing games because Marcus snored like a chainsaw," Gunther said. "It came up in the course of everything that came up."

"Well, don't hold Gunther's whoring against him," Candy tells Dianne. "It was just the _one_ whore, and he really did fancy her. He would have married her if she'd been willing. And, don't worry, she didn't have anything nasty." She grabs her order pad and heads off to Mitch and the commander's table.

Gunther sighs. "I'm beginning to regret introducing you to my friends."

"You do have an interesting crop of them," Dianne replies before taking a sip of her beer. She sets it down on the bar. "In the old world, I never would have considered dating a man who hung out with prostitutes. Or saw one himself."

"Maybe you _did_ date such a man," Gunther says. "And he just wasn't honest about it."

"I doubt that. I mostly dated cops. Well, and a couple of firemen. A cowboy, once."

"So you worked your way through the entire female fantasy catalog?" Gunther asks. "This is making me feel inadequate."

"Gunther's a cowboy," Linda says as she sets the now full growler on the bar and begins sealing it.

"I don't think milking cows makes me a cowboy," Gunther replies.

"You broke a wild horse for Jamestown once."

"I didn't break it. I found it wounded and nursed it until it trusted me."

"Gunther has a soft spot for wounded things," Linda tells Dianne. "That's why his interest in you is a puzzle to us. You seem very…put together."

"We're all wounded," Dianne replies. "We just deal with it in different ways."

"I suppose you're right." Linda pulls out a metal cash box, opens it, and starts putting Daryl's ammo inside. "Do you want to stay for a drink?" she asks him.

Yes, he does. Very badly. Then he won't have to decorate. Or listen to Rachel and Carol go at it. But he just spent fifteen rounds of ammo, and he can't afford to part with more. "Nah. 'S m'little girl's birthday." He slides the growler from the bar.

[*]

Carol puts a single candle in the center of the cake she baked. She covered it with a sweet, white cream cheese icing. Nothing fancy, but none of them has had cake in years.

"Happy Birthday to you!" Henry starts singing.

"Happy Bird day to you!" Gary joins in.

"Happy Birthday dear Sweetheart," Shannon sings.

Garland, Rachel, and Carol join in on the finish - "Happy Birthday to you!"

Daryl alone seems uncomfortable with all the sinning.

Carol sets the cake on the tray of Sweetheart's highchair and tries to show the baby how to blow it out. Sweetheart laughs, reaches out her little hand, and grabs the flame. "Ought!" she shouts.

"Well," Garland says, "she did extinguish it in her fashion."

Sweetheart opens her closed hand, turns it, and looks at her palm. "Boo boo!"

Carol kisses her palm and says, "All better."

"'S her second new word this week," Daryl says proudly. "That makes seven. Book says most kids only say one to three words by now."

Sweetheart plucks the candle out of the cake and proceeds to try to eat it. Carol takes it from her and puts the cake on the table and quickly cuts it before Sweetheart can start crying over the denied candle. She serves Sweetheart a small piece. The moment it's on her tray, she stops making her ready-to-fuss face and looks at it curiously. Sweetheart grabs half of it and shoves it in her mouth. Her hazel eyes light up like saucers. She bounces in place in her highchair and grabs some more, smearing her face with icing.

"Cake pwease!" Gary says.

Carol serves the rest of the party guests.

"You're a really good baker," Rachel tells her.

"Thank you." Carol expects her to say something more, like, _I would have made Henry bake half the cake_ , but she doesn't.

VanDaryl, who is on Shannon's hip, tries to reach for her piece of cake. "No," she tells him. "You're too little for this."

"Oh, let him have some icing at least." Garland dips his finger in the icing, slides off a bit, and holds his finger out to the baby. VanDaryl leans forward and sucks the icing off with a pleased murmur.

"Time for pwesents?" Gary asks when he finishes his last bite.

"Gary's really excited to share is gift," Shannon explains.

"Go ahead," Carol tells him, though the rest are still eating.

Gary gets down from the table and runs to the foyer where he left his present. He brings it back, puts it on Sweetheart's icing-smeared highchair table, and demands, "Open it!"

Sweetheart grabs the lumpy, unevenly wrapped gift and bangs it on the table.

"No, silly! Like this." Gary takes the gift from her and rips the paper off to reveal two of his favorite matchbox cars, including his little fire truck.

"Oh, that was very sweet of him," Carol tells Shannon.

Sweetheart proceeds to try to shove the firetruck in her mouth.

"No, silly!" Gary tells her as he takes the truck from her hand. "Like this!" He runs the truck back and forth over her table and lets go. Sweetheart imitates him, pushing the truck through her icing and cake crumbs. "Wooh wee wooh!" Gary tells her. "Wooh wee wooh!"

"Wooooooh!" Sweetheart mimics as she runs the truck around.

"That's eight words," Daryl says. "She's three times as smart as your average one-year-old."

Carol chuckles, shakes her head, and finishes her last bite of cake.

Henry offers up his gift next – a delicately, hand carved wooden spinning top made by the Kingdom's old master carpenter. He apparently traded for it at the fair in anticipation of his visit. It's beautiful, but of course Sweetheart merely attempts to put it in her mouth. Henry takes it away from her and spins it across the kitchen table.

The most appropriate gift, perhaps, comes from Shannon and Garland – plastic teething rings. "Keep them in the cooler," Shannon advises her. "The cold will feel good on her gums."

Carol doesn't remind her this is not the first baby she's raised from infancy.

Daryl and Carol's gift to Sweetheart is a rocking horse they paid Dante in tobacco to carve. Sweetheart can only ride it with assistance, and she gets tired of it after a while, so Daryl puts her on the bearskin rug with VanDaryl, who is sitting and watching everything quietly. Gary immediately runs for the vacated rocking horse. He rocks it so hard it almost falls over on its own nose. VanDaryl, meanwhile, gets up on all fours and rocks his body in imitation of his big brother.

Daryl starts pouring beer for the adults, so no one notices when the baby boy begins crawling, stealthily, toward the horse. They hear him when Gary rocks right onto his hand, though. He lets out a howling wail. It's a loud noise coming from the usually quiet boy. There's a flurry of rushing and comforting, and apologies from Gary.

"Did he crawl there?" Garland asks.

"He crawled, baby!" Shannon exclaims as she bounces the baby in her arms. "He crawled!"

"Good job, little man!" Daryl tells him, and VanDaryl sniffles one last time. A tear weaves its way down from his blue-green eye and across his left cheek. His frown turns up, and his face breaks into a sweet grin.


	148. Chapter 148

When Henry and Rachel go out to the tavern for dinner, Garland and Shannon still linger at the Dixon cabin. The men are out back grilling while Gary plays with some neighborhood kids. VanDaryl naps in the crib while Shannon nurses Sweetheart in the rocking chair and asks, "How are you getting along with your daughter-in-law?"

"As well as I can," Carol answers as she sets the table.

Shannon chuckles. "Some things never change even when the world collapses."

"Henry seems happy, so that's what matters."

"He seems a little hen-pecked," Shannon says.

"You said it, not me."

"But you _wanted_ to," Shannon tells her.

Carol laughs. "I'm trying my best to keep my mouth shut. They're here for one more full day tomorrow, and then I don't see him again until May."

"I think she's just asserting her dominance," Shannon says. "Marking her territory, letting you know she's the woman of his house now."

"I haven't been the woman of Henry's house for two years." Carol sighs. "I don't know if that makes it easier or harder."

"I don't even want to think about my boys at that age. Gary's going to be like a wild sailor, chasing girls right and left, and VanDaryl won't even be able to _talk_ to them."

Carol chuckles. "Like his namesake?"

"Daryl's never been shy with girls, has he?"

"I don't know if _shy_ is the right word, but he's not exactly suave."

"I worry about VanDaryl sometimes," Shannon admits. "He's so strangely _quiet_ , Carol. I swear, I have nightmares where I'm in the old world and I forget he's in the car seat and I just leave him there when I go into the grocery store. Do you ever have old world nightmares?"

"Sometimes." Carol draws down glasses from the hutch. "Usually starring my abusive ex-husband. And then I wake up and realize who I'm married to now, and there's a huge wave of relief."

"Strange, to think the old world is a nightmare and _this one_ is the dream."

The last glass clinks on the table. "We've done what we could to build a decent world." Carol sets the water pitcher in the center of the table.

Shannon dislodges Sweetheart from her breast and buttons up. The one-year-old slides out of Shannon's lap, walks two steps, and then crawls the rest of the way to the crib, through the open drapes.

"Sweetie, don't wake the baby," Carol says as she pulls up on the crib bars to peer in at VanDaryl, who has rolled onto his stomach and now sleeps with his bottom pushed in the air.

The door opens, and the men come in with a pan of sausages, grilled corn on the cob, and Dog at their heels. Dog runs over to the baby's room and settles down on the circular rug before the rocking chair. That's his guard dog position. It's where he sleeps at nights now, instead of the bear skin rug. Sweetheart plops down on the floor again and crawls over to Daryl, who is setting the pan on the kitchen table. She pulls up on his leg, looks up at him, and says, "Dada."

"Hey, baby girl." He picks her up and puts her in her highchair and locks the tray table down.

"Gary's still playing," Garland tells Shannon as they all gather around the table. "Let's just feed him later."

Carol puts some soft, cut-up, boiled pieces of carrot on Sweetheart's tray and then sits down across from Shannon.

"Ought!" Sweetheart says.

"Ain't hot." Daryl reaches over, grabs a piece of carrot, tosses it in his mouth, and mushes it around with an exaggerated, "Mmmmmm."

Sweetheart picks up a piece, mushes it around her mouth, and mimics, "Mhmmmm."

"Garland spent an hour in his office today alone with Cyndie," Shannon tells Carol as the food is passed and put on plates.

"I'm the mayor of Jamestown, darling," Garland replies. "She's the chieftain of Oceanside. We had to meet."

"For an hour? With the blinds drawn and the door closed?"

"Men would have been constantly walking by and peering in if I'd left those blinds open. They're like sharks smelling blood in the water when there's an unmarried woman in town."

"She is very pretty, isn't she?" Shannon asks.

"Yes."

Shannon slaps his knee under the table. "Baby! You're supposed to say - not as pretty as _me_."

"But she's at least as pretty as me," Garland replies.

Daryl chuckles, and Shannon shakes her head. "You're point balance is getting low, baby."

Garland passes her the water pitcher. "You're not _really_ jealous, are you?"

"No. I'm just teasing. But if she hadn't already hooked up with Captain McBride, I might suspect her motives." She looks across the table at Carol. "These poor Jamestown men. Three unmarried women come speeding down the river one day, and they've _all_ got boyfriends here already."

"All?" Garland asks. "What about the stern-looking one? Dianne?"

"She's seeing Gunther," Carol says.

"Really?"

"I told you all this two weeks ago, baby." Shannon insists with a bob of her red hair. "I gave you all the juicy gossip. Further proof you just don't _listen_ to me."

"Gunther?" Garland asks.

"Why not Gunther?" Shannon replies. "He's handsome enough, when he remembers to shave. And those hazel eyes. They're just lovely."

"Well I hope that doesn't work out," Garland mutters.

"Why not?" Carol asks.

"I don't want him moving to Oceanside. He's invaluable. I fully expect Ernesto to step aside in the next one to two years and the council to make Gunther the head farm manager. Carolyn warned about this. She warned we could lose talent."

"Carolyn is always seeing the downside of everything," Shannon insists.

"True," Carol agrees, "but every council probably needs someone like that. She makes us think about the potential costs of our decisions."

"Well, if it gets serious," Shannon suggests, "maybe Dianne will move here. So we might _gain_ talent. She was a knight, right? She'd make a great guard or deputy."

"Cyndie told me she's one of her advisors," Garland says. "She's in their government. She may not want to leave."

"Well Gunther's in _our_ government," Shannon replies, "and it's like pulling teeth to get him to leave Jamestown. He's been here longer than you have. That man is the homebody of homebodies. And he only went on that trip because you made him. You don't have to worry about him leaving. Trust me."

"And Raul seems to be interested in this Enid woman," Garland says. "He's a jack of all trades, that young man. I'd hate to lose him to the Hilltop. She's their _doctor_ , Cyndie says. Absolutely invaluable. She's not going to abandon her town."

"So you were mostly discussing government business with Cyndie?" Shannon asks.

"And our favorite sexual positions," Garland deadpans.

Daryl snorts.

Shannon points a fork at her husband. "You're about to lose all the points in your bank, mister, if you don't watch out."

Sweetheart says, "Uh oh."

"I think Raul and Enid are taking things slowly," Carol says. "They won't end up married tomorrow."

"They're adorable," Shannon agrees. "We saw them at the movies last night. We got Mrs. Watson to babysit and Garland took me. They were so cute, holding hands, Enid jumping and grabbing his arm at the scary parts. Like a couple of high school kids."

"They aren't high school kids," Garland replies. "They're grown-ups, and he's going to follow that girl to the Hilltop one day. Mark my words. And we may lose Captain McBride, too. Certainly the _chieftan_ of a Oceanside won't be leaving it to move here."

"Oh, Cyndie's never going to want him to move in with her," Shannon insists. "You can tell those two are just fucking. Probably the down and dirty nasty kind of fucking, too. A woman doesn't want that every day, and the distance probably just makes it better."

"Language, darling," Garland warns. "Innocent ears."

"Uh oh," Sweetheart says.

"I'll give you we may lose Raul," Shannon continues, "but not for a year at least. We won't lose McBride, and we won't lose Gunther. We may _gain_ Dianne, if he doesn't botch it. Now _you_ mark _my_ words."

"You are a good judge of people," Garland concedes. He points to his plate with his fork. "This is excellent, Carol, thank you."

"Hell, man," Daryl mutters. "I grilled it."

"But I doubt you seasoned it."

Carol smiles, while Daryl shakes his head.

[*]

On Saturday morning, Daryl goes hunting, and Rachel joins Cyndie, Captain McBride, and a crew of sailors and fisherman as they sail down river to try to snare some catfish. There won't be many good fishing days left before the surface of the river begins to ice, and the nets are already coming back lighter and lighter each day.

Carol's glad for Rachel's choice, because it gives her some time alone with Henry. She takes him on a grand tour of the entire town and then through the exhibits in the museum. When he sees her big-breasted sketch on the wall, he seems torn between laughter, embarrassment, and irritation. "Why'd they draw you like that?"

"Daryl wasn't thrilled either."

"It's like a comic book woman with those …umm." He shakes his head as if trying to shake the image out. "I like Daryl's scar, though. That's bad ass. He should try to get one like that."

"No, thank you," Carol says. "Daryl doesn't need anymore scars."

Henry's impressed with the armory and the laundry room. She shows him the theater/library next. The chalkboard sign outside reads:

 _Showing This Week –_

 _Friday  
7:30 PM – Jaws_

 _Saturday  
2:00 PM – Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory  
7:30 PM – Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back_

 _Tickets – 1 round of ammo each  
Small Popcorn – 2 rounds of ammo  
Small Ice Tea – 1 round of ammo  
Water - free_

"Rachel's going to love this tonight. You know, she hasn't seen _any_ movie at all since the collapse?"

"Really?" Carol asks as she shows him inside and flicks on the overhead lights, which illuminate the bookcases lining the walls on either side.

Henry begins to walk slowly along them, looking at the spines. "Remember when Dad got that old projector up and running in the Kingdom? And he we had that week-long movie festival in the school theater until the bulb burned out?"

Carol laughs. "Yeah. But the only reels we could find for it were movies they'd shown in the school."

"I really know my Shakespeare, now. And my Civil War history." Henry slides out a book and turns it over. "I wonder why the school even had a projector that old. I mean, it wasn't the 1900s when the world ended."

"Please don't refer to my childhood as the _nineteen hundreds_."

Henry laughs. "Sorry."

"I think somebody was skimming off the top in the D.C. public school system. That entire school was outdated," Carol says. "But it worked for us. For a time."

Henry nods. "Yeah. It did." He looks around. "But Dad would be amazed to see a town like this."

"He would," Carol says quietly.

"Do you miss him, ever?"

"Sometimes."

"But you've got Daryl now." Henry slides the book back into its spot on the shelf. "I'm glad you do, Mom. I don't really _get_ him sometimes, but I admire him. And he's right. For you."

"He is," Carol agrees. "Like Rachel is for you."

"Except you don't really think that." Henry slides out another book.

"What makes you say that?" Carol asks.

"I can just tell. You think she's too opinionated."

"Henry, I can see you're happy. That's what matters to me. And I've certainly got nothing against a woman having her own opinions. But she could let up on the little jabs about the way I run my household."

Henry shrugs. "Yeah. I noticed that. I mentioned it to her."

"You did?"

He nods. "I don't think you'll be hearing that from her for the rest of our visit."

"Oh." Carol's surprised and a little impressed that Henry stood up for her, or stood up for himself. However he sees that, she's glad he did it.

He turns the _Art of War_ toward her. "Think I can borrow this until you come to Oceanside in May?"

Carol shrugs. "Just sign it out. There are no due dates. People just track you down when they really want a book you haven't returned."

Henry smiles. "They'd have to track me a long way."

As they're leaving the theater, Henry says, "This town is really nice."

"It really is." Carol flicks off the light switch. "Who knows, you and Rachel might want to move here one day."

"Mom."

"Why not?" she asks.

"Well, for one thing, we just finished building our own cabin. For another, Rachel's an advisor. She's important. She's in the government. Like you."

Carol nods. She smiles lightly at the _like you_. Henry's apparently taken her as an example of what a woman should be.

[*]

It's quiet in the evening, when Henry and Rachel are at the movies. Sweetheart has been put to bed, and Carol is reading in the rocking chair while Daryl sits in the armchair and cleans the disassembled AR-15 she practiced firing today. She and Henry spent a little time on the range together. Henry clearly hasn't shot in a _long_ time. Then again, neither has Daryl.

"You really need to get on the range, Pookie. Stay in shape with firearms."

"Mhmhm." Daryl puts a cloth on the tip of a cleaning rod. "Ammo's money."

"I know, but…" She lowers her book to look at him. "If we ever have to go to war again, I don't think the crossbow is going to cut it. Shoot with me next week, when we get our ammo rations. Just six rounds each. You aren't paying anyone to build the cabin anymore. You can still get a pint of beer and a whiskey at the tavern next week and have five rounds to save. Come practice with me."

"Gonna get me laid?"

"Maybe. I do like spending quality time with you."

"A'right then." Daryl slides the rod into the barrel and pushes it back and forth suggestively while looking at her.

Carol rolls her eyes.

"Only funny when you do it, huh?" he asks. He yanks the rod back out and the now blackened cloth flutters to the ground. He lifts the barrel and looks down it at her.

"Can you see me now?"

"All clean." He lays the rod aside and begins reassembling the rifle.

"Thank you for doing that for me, Pookie. I appreciate it."

"Yeah. Earn me any points?"

She puts a bookmark in her book. "A few."

"Yeah?" He stands, puts the rifle in the hooks over the fireplace, and comes over and puts a hand on each of the arms of her rocking chair. He bends down to kiss her. Their tongues have just begun to tangle when there's a knock at the door. Daryl pulls away, sighing. "Better be damn important."

He answers with a brusque, "What?"

Raul's voice comes from the other side: "Uh…sorry. I guess it's kind of late?"

"Nah," Daryl's voice softens. "Nah, not really. 'S only nine. C'mon in." He opens wide the door and Raul comes in and waves to Carol. "Hello, Deputy Dixon."

Carol smiles. "Hello, Raul."

"I just wondered if I could buy some eggs from you, if you have any left? We used all ours for the week, but what with Enid being here, I just wanted to make her a nice breakfast tomorrow before she goes back home."

"Sure," Carol tells him. She stands and comes over to look in the cooler. "We have two left." She hands them to him.

A hand in each egg, he asks, "What do you want for them?"

"Just give us two next week when you get your rations."

"You sure?"

She nods. "How's Enid liking Jamestown?"

"Oh, a lot. We went to see _Jaws_ last night. And then tonight we went dancing at the tavern."

"Big plans for tonight?" Carol asks.

"My dad's headed out to work now. Night patrol." He shrugs. "So we're going to stay in and watch a movie on the portable DVD player I found in Yorktown. I figure those alkaline batteries we scavenged won't last more than a year. Might as well use them up."

"You gotta live a little," Carol agrees. "What movie?"

Raul shrugs. "Some romantic comedy Enid picked from the library." In addition to books, the library has DVDs, because the theater's projector is attached to a DVD player. "It about this guy and this girl."

"'N he gets 'er in the end," Daryl says. "In the last ten minutes. Yeah. Seen that one."

Carol chuckles.

Raul thanks them again and then, with one egg in each hand, waves goodbye. Carol opens the door for him. When she's closed it, she leans back against it, smiles teasingly, and says, "I think we have about thirty minutes before Henry and Rachel get back."

Daryl puts one hand on the door just to the side of her head and leans in to nip at her neck. Then he nibbles her ear. "Yeah?" he murmurs. "Want me to clean yer barrel?"

Carol bursts out laughing. Daryl laughs too. Soon, however, the laughter turns to playful kissing and petting and, then something much more earnest. In end, Daryl turns her around and takes her against the door. By the time the newlyweds return, they're all buttoned up and sitting on the couch in the living room, each having abruptly grabbed a book, and looking quite innocent.

"I didn't think you read for fun," Rachel says to Daryl.

"'Course I read." He goes to turn a page and realizes the book is upside down. Carol laughs as he turns it right side up.


	149. Chapter 149

The goodbyes are long on Jamestown's dock. Captain McBride is the first to pull away and hand Cyndie into the boat. Henry dislodges himself from his mother's hug and follows Rachel. Enid slides off the picnic table where she's been sitting and kissing Raul goodbye, and he reluctantly walks with her, hand-in-hand, to the boat. Gunther and Dianne are still talking softly, heads bent toward one another, when Cyndie whistles the archer over. Dianne kisses Gunther's cheek, trails a hand along his arm, and disappears into the speed boat.

Captain McBride shouts orders for the river gates to be rolled open while the sailors untie the speedboat and toss the ropes inside. The boat roars to life, speeds forward, and makes a U-turn in the river before disappearing in the looming shadow of the _Susan Constant_ and then vanishing up river.

"It's a long time till May," Raul mutters.

"Well maybe Enid will come on the postal run in March," Carol says.

"What?" Raul asks.

"Cyndie spoke with Mayor Barron about expanding the Alliance's pony express to Jamestown," Carol explains. "Except, instead of a pony, this leg would be the speedboat, at least until that second battery fails in two or three years. Then I suppose we'll be out of the loop again. But the plan is that they'll make a postal trip once a month starting in March, after the thaw, and ending in December, except for May and November, because we'll be at Oceanside to trade."

"They'll be here eight times a year?" Gunther asks.

"I don't know _who_ , exactly," Carol cautions. "Someone from Oceanside. Cyndie probably won't leave every month, being the leader, but they have other women who can drive."

"And Dianne?"

"I wouldn't be surprised if she volunteered to provide security when she hears about it," Carol says. "Henry said he'll come on a few of the trips. They may switch people out each time."

"Enid probably won't come," Raul mutters. "She'd have to travel from the Hilltop first, and she's their doctor. She can't leave that often."

"Oh, I don't know," Gunther says. "She left the Hilltop in November, and again in December, didn't she?"

"Well, she _is_ training that apprentice and trying to give him some time to manage on his own," Raul says. As they begin walking from the docks back toward the settlement, he asks Carol, "Are there a lot of single men at the Hilltop?"

Carol smiles affectionately. "Obviously not any that have proved interesting enough to Enid."

"Yeah. It sounds like she hasn't had a lot of boyfriends in her life. Just three."

"Three?" Carol asks. She doesn't remember Enid dating anyone, but she never really got to know the young woman.

"Some guy named Ron, then Carl."

Carol had buried Ron Anderson, his meddlesome little brother Sam, and his abusive father Pete in the vaults of her memory. But now the thought of the Wolves raiding Alexandria, and what she had to do to protect those people, hits her like a punch in the gut. But it's a quick punch, that leaves only a lingering ache. She's largely come to peace with her violent past.

"Carl seemed special to her. Ron seemed more like, well, honestly, my first girlfriend. Just kind of…" Raul shrugs. "You're both there, you're both around the same age, so, why not? Then she dated some man named Alden for a couple months. But he was older and wanted to move too fast, so she broke up with him, and he ended up marrying someone from Oceanside eventually."

"Heads up, young man," Gunther says, "that was her way of hinting you better not move too fast."

"Yeah. I kind of figured that out."

"Let her lead."

"You've had a lot of experience with women?" Raul asks.

Gunther laughs. "No. I married my high school sweetheart. After she left me, I had the boys. Raising them and running our family farm was my focus, not women. Then there was Megan, though I don't know if you'd properly call that a relationship. And…now, I suppose, Dianne."

"Wow. I've had as many girlfriends as _you_ have."

"So Enid's your girlfriend?" Gunther asks.

"Well…I mean. Maybe."

Gunther chuckles.

[*]

"Ya a'right?" Daryl asks between bites. He was out late hunting with Mitch, and when he got home, Sweetheart was already in bed. His supper, which Carol tried to keep warm, is cold, but he's eating it hungrily.

Carol is sitting in the rocking chair, staring blankly at the fire, her book in her lap. He thinks she must be sad about Henry leaving. She draws her gaze from the flames. "Something Raul said today, it reminded me of the Wolves. Of Carl. Of everything we've lost."

Daryl swallows his last bite, leaves the table, and sits on the couch. He pats the cushion beside himself, and Carol accepts his invitation, tossing her book on the coffee table and then curling up against his side. He wraps both arms around her and kisses the top of her head.

Carol sighs heavily. "Carl was just a little boy, Daryl. Like my Sophia. But he made it out alive. She didn't, but he did - again and again, he made it out alive. And I thought he'd _keep_ making it. He survived so much. So much. And after all that, to get bitten doing something foolish? He was the future. And the future's not supposed to _die_."

Daryl bends his head to nuzzle her cheek with his nose. "Future's asleep in that crib," he murmurs. "'N she's safe behind all these fences. Jamestown has an army. An arsenal. A goddamn _tavern_. 'S the first real town we've ever been in. 'S a town, Carol. Ain't just a camp."

"I'm afraid to hope."

Daryl tilts her chin up with a single finger. "Don't gotta. Just live. Day by day. We got a good life, you and me. These days…they been the best damn days of m'life. Don't gotta hope or wish or plan past the winter. Just savor 'em." He kisses away the tears that have slowly streaked halfway down her cheeks. Then he kisses her lips softly, pulls away, and holds her face in his hands. He strokes his thumb over her dampened cheek.

"I love you," she whispers. "And I'll love you tomorrow, and the next day, and the day after that. And if those are the only days we have, it's enough."

[*]

Carol wants a tree for Christmas. It's goddamn ridiculous, Daryl thinks, bringing a real live tree out of the forest and into that cabin, which is crowded enough as is. Dangerous, too. What are the odds Sweetheart isn't going to try to pull up on it and pull it down on herself?

But Carol wants a tree for Christmas.

So Carol's going to get a goddamn tree.

"This is the one?" Dante asks skeptically as they stand in the woods outside the west gate. He takes a puff of his hand-rolled cigarette and looks over the specimen Carol picked out yesterday. As far as Inola knows, Dante quit smoking. But Daryl knows otherwise, because he can occasionally still pay the man in tobacco to help him out.

"'S what she wanted," Daryl says. "Now help me cut it 'n bring it in."

"Looks a little Charlie Brown."

"Well, roof ain't that high on the cabin."

"Are you _sure_ this is the one she picked?" Dante asks before he takes his final puff. He drops the cigarette to the ground and stomps it out beneath his heel.

"S fine. 'S full. Just short."

"It's missing about six branches in the middle here."

"'S fine. Just turn that side the to wall."

"I think you could have managed to cut this one down yourself," Dante says.

"Need ya to help me carry it back, though. 'N then, need ya to help me move the furniture 'round so it's where Carol wants it."

"Ah. So I'm not getting paid just to cut down the tree." Dante drops his pack to the ground and removes his axe. "Well, watch out when I shout timber!"

They get the tree set up while Carol's on patrol and Sweetheart is with Shannon. Daryl wants to surprise her. He gets the base from storage. Jamestown has every odd thing imaginable in that storehouse. The base was probably meant to be used for a _useful_ tree of some kind, but here it is, in the corner where the bookcase used to be, the bookcase that is now beside the window on the back wall of the cabin.

Dante slides the last couple of books back onto the bookcase as Daryl finishes situating the tree. "Did she have these in any particular order? Because if so, they aren't anymore."

"Dunno," Daryl says. She probably did. Probably organized by spine height or some shit, or maybe alphabetical by author.

"You got any mint leaves?" Dante asks.

"Hell for?"

"I suck on them after I smoke. So Inola doesn't taste it when she kisses me."

Daryl gestures to the windowsill where four small pots of herbs rest. Dante goes over and plucks off a leaf. "What do you guys use them for?"

"Flavor," Daryl says. "Carol makes a mean mint tea. 'N she's gonna make mint rock candy for m'stocking."

Dante sucks on the leaf, slides it from his mouth, and asks, skeptically, " _You're_ putting up stockings?"

"Carol likes her Christmas bullshit."

Dante chuckles and resumes sucking on the leaf.

"'Sides, gotta kid now. Guess we gotta make it fun for 'er. Giver her traditions and shit." Daryl leans back against the mantle. "My parents never did."

Dante mumbles around the mint leaf. "You didn't celebrate Christmas?"

"Used to. But m'dad lost his shit when he got drunk 'n fell into the tree 'n it fell into the TV, so my mama never wanted a tree after that."

"You get presents?"

"Yeah. Sometimes. From yard sales. But sometimes Santa forgot."

"Shit man, that sucks. Me, I don't celebrate. I'm Jewish."

"Pffft."

Dante spits out the mushed, mangled leaf in their trashcan. "What?" he asks. "Why the laugh?"

"Don't look Jewish."

"Yeah? What's a Jewish person look like?"

"Dunno. Not like you."

Dante laughs. "Well, my mother was an Ethiopian Jew, but she came to American when she was seventeen. My dad was an atheist. How about you? Are you Christian?"

"I ain't nothin' really."

"So just indulging Carol?"

He shrugs. "This shit makes her happy. ' N seein' 'er happy makes me happy, so…maybe 'm just indulgin' myself."

Dante smiles. "Well, I wish I was getting peppermint candy in my stocking."

Carol is thrilled when she comes back from her patrol rounds to discover the tree. They have to decorate it with ornaments and tinsel left over from decorating the fake Christmas tree that's on display in the orphanage. As Daryl suspected, Sweetheart tries to pull the whole thing down. He puts a plastic gate around the tree, one that was snaps together and was meant to serve as a pen for puppies, while Carol hangs the stockings she's knitted on the mantle. He turns around when he's done with the gate to see where Sweetheart is and finds her up on the couch. She wasn't up there before. "Shit," he mutters. "She's climbin'."

Carol turns to look. "I know. She climbed out of the crib this morning after you were already gone hunting and nearly fell out doing it. I guess she's getting a toddler bed for Christmas."

[*]

Sweetheart does get a toddler bed from Christmas (or at least Daryl converts her crib into one by taking off the rails and lowering the mattress), as well as few new toys and clothes. Daryl gives Carol some jewelry he bought out of the storehouse, which she thanks him for, even though she's not likely to wear it often – it's not exactly practical in this world. Daryl lets Sweetheart have a few licks of his peppermint candy. He also gets a scarf Carol knitted him. It's solid black, which he seems to appreciate, and he acts like he's really going to wear it, though she's not sure he will.

It's a quiet Christmas at home, with ham for dinner (Jamestown has slaughtered a few of its eldest pigs, as it does annually on this occasion, which has resulted in about two pounds of pork per household). The fire blazes in the hearth now as Sweetheart snuggles sleepily against Daryl's chest on the couch. She perks up when there's a knock at the door, and Carol goes to answer.

"Come here," she tells Daryl and the baby.

Daryl carries Sweetheart over, and the little girl's eyes widen and she points at the small crowd gathered outside. A bunch of children, aged about six to twelve, stand out front with one of the school teachers. They burst into "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen." The kids have two more carols for the Dixons before they move on to the next cabin, and Carol wishes she had something to give them for their trouble.

[*]

Jamestown is bursting with noise on New Year's Eve. The tavern is open past curfew, until midnight. There are horns and whistles and hollers and shouts as the homemade calendar on the tavern wall is turned to 9 NE.

Daryl and Carol can hear faints echoes of the excitement, all the way back in the fort, through the cabin walls. "Happy New Year," Carol tells him, and then kisses him soundly before the fireplace. She walks over to the coffee table and pours them each a glass from the last bottle of wine she traded for at Oceanside. It's not champagne, but it'll do. He settles down next to her on the couch and raises his glass.

"Do you have a toast?" she asks.

"No. Figured you did."

"I've got nothing," she admits.

Daryl shrugs and throws back a gulp of wine.

Carol takes a smaller sip, while Sweetheart stirs on her toddler bed, rolls from her side to her stomach, and goes back to sleep.

"Sophia's birthday was January 1," Carol says quietly. "She was my New Year's miracle. She would have been twenty-one today. I would have been taking her out for her first drink. I mean…if the world had never ended."

Daryl raises his glass again. "'N let's drink to 'er."

Carol nods. "To Sophia," she says, her voice not cracking, but threatening to. She raises her glass and clinks Daryl's.

"To all of 'em," Daryl says. "Every damn last one who couldn't be here."

"But we're here," Carol says, smiling through misty eyes. "We're still here." The wine is bitter-sweet on her tongue. They finish the bottle together, and make love on the bear skin rug before the fireplace, finally winding their way to bed at almost two in the morning.


	150. Chapter 150

The shutters of the Dixon family cabin are closed tightly against the winter wind. Outside, six-inch icicles hang like daggers from the roof. Tiny footsteps patter across the wooden floor. "Code, code!"

Carol flings the blankets back and settles Sweetheart between her and Daryl. Cold, tiny feet bend back against Daryl's bare stomach where his sweatshirt has ridden up. He pulls the sweatshirt down, puts the feet outside it, and drifts back to sleep, until a swift kick in the balls awakens him.

Daryl, taking his pillow with him, slides covertly out of bed. He adds another log to the dying fire. It crackles and catches and sends the flames leaping up the chimney. He snags the blanket from off the back of the couch and settles in again to sleep.

A presence awakens him. He opens one eye to find Sweetheart standing before him, a hand on his bent elbow, her light hazel eyes looking into his. "Code, Dada! Code, code."

Daryl sighs and throws back his blanket. She crawls up onto the couch with him and turns, pressing her back against his stomach. He sweeps the blanket over her, resting his arm across, and she falls immediately back to sleep. Carol says his body is like a heat generator, and maybe that's why Sweetheart's chosen him instead of her, but now he's probably not getting much sleep tonight. She'll start dreaming, and those little legs will start flailing.

Sweetheart's chest rises and falls with the gentle wisps of her sleeping breath, and Daryl's annoyance fades to wonder. This tiny, trusting creature has turned to him – a Dixon by blood and temperament – with innocent assurance. She doesn't care who he was or where he came from, how many people he's killed or how far he's roamed. She feels safe and secure beside him. He's her warmth against the cold, her protector against monsters in the night.

Daryl kisses the top of her head, his lips pressing against the soft, silky light brown threads of her hair. "Nite, baby girl," he whispers.

[*]

It's the coldest winter on record in James City County, or at least the old timers who grew up in these parts say. The officer's cabins on the ships are difficult to warm because of the risk of fire. So Commander Witherspoon "temporarily" moves into Mitch's hut. The rest of the officers take over the room in the lightly heated museum that was vacated by the Kingdom women. Five of those women moved into the new dormitory (which is heated by wood stoves pumped through a duct system), while Sarah married Santiago and now shares his cabin.

The tavern closes down for a time. The place is too big to heat thoroughly. Linda goes to stay with her man Ernesto for the worst of the winter, while Candy, in Gunther's words, is "playing musical beds in the dormitory."

"Do we need to worry about an STD outbreak here?" Dr. Ahmad asks during a council meeting.

Carol understands the necessity of this conversation, but it's not the most comfortable one they've ever had in these chambers.

Gunther scratches his cheek. "Well, I'm not the doctor here," he says, "but she hasn't had anything _yet_ , has she? And she's interacting with the same handful of men – fewer, really – than she did in the days when the whorehut was open. It's essentially a closed group."

"It _was_ a closed group," Dr. Ahmad cautions, "Before the trade trip to Oceanside. Not to be a gossip, but is she _interacting_ with any of the men who went on that trip?"

"Seaman Harrison, maybe," Gunther answers.

" _Semen_ ," Barry chuckles.

Carol rolls her eyes.

"Captain McBride said he won't approve Seaman Harrison for any future trade crews," Commander Witherspoon notes. "And I doubt very much he was successful in… _interacting_ with a woman at Oceanside."

Carol tries not to laugh at all these men delicately saying _interacting_.

"I don't guess we can successfully outlaw these interactions?" Garland asks.

"It was one thing to shut the whorehut down," Deputy Thomas reasons. "I understand not wanting to encourage it or give it public sanction. But if we try to outlaw what's essentially private sleeping around…" He shakes his head. "She'll just say they're _all_ her boyfriends, and she's dating them all. And like any boyfriend, they like to make her dinner. Or buy her a drink. Or give her a little gift."

"I have to agree with Thomas," Carolyn says. "I think this is beyond our reach. They aren't disturbing the peace. They aren't violating curfew or quiet hours. None of our government officials – I _assume_ \- are involved."

"Unless _you_ are," Barry says with a wiggle of his eyebrow.

Carolyn flicks him off.

"How many men are we talking about?" Dr. Ahmad asks.

"Six, maybe," Gunther answers. "Seven at most. She's not doing anything that can get her pregnant."

The doctor drums his fingers on the table. "Is she engaging in anal sex?"

"Oh God!" Inola covers her eyes with a hand and leans on her elbow on the table. "Is this level of detail really necessary?"

"It's useful for risk assessment," Dr. Ahmad answers.

"No," Gunther says. "Not Candy. I think fellatio would be the extent of it."

"What are you, her pimp?" Barry asks.

Gunther glares at him.

"I'm just saying, you're very well informed."

"I know Candy." Before Barry can say anyhting, Gunther proceeds, " _Not_ carnally."

"But you weren't a stranger to the whorehut either, were you?" Barry asks. "Does Dianne know about Megan?"

"I've been honest with Dianne," Gunther drawls with forced calm, "but that's my business and her business and none of yours. And Candy is like a little sister to me. I can't talk her out of making the choices she makes, but I can worry about her. And I do. So forgive me if I keep an eye out for her."

"Barry," Garland says thinly, "don't provoke him."

Barry snots. "I bet Gunther's never been in a fight in his life."

Now Gunther does raise his voice, and it booms. "How do you think I've survived this long if I can't fight?"

"You hid behind the Navy boys, ran to Jamestown as soon as you could, and then never left the gates," Barry says.

Gunther stands up abruptly. He looks about ready to launch over the table at Barry when Garland says, "Sit down. We won't have brawling in the Council Chambers."

Gunther does sit down, with his eyes on Barry.

"So are we just decided to do nothing about this?" Garland asks.

"Not entirely," Dr. Ahmad replies. "I'll have Raul grow more penicillium mold, just in case. But we need to requisition some ingredients from the pantry."

"All in favor?" Garland asks. All nine hands go up.

"And since you _are_ keeping an eye on Candy?" Dr. Ahmad asks. Gunther finally turns his cool gaze from Barry to the doctor. "If you could give us a list of her..." The docotor drums his fingers again, "...boyfriends, we could try to make sure they don't get on the ship to Oceanside in May. We don't want those men bringing back anything they don't already have."

"Or spreading anything _there_ ," Carol says.

"That, too."

"I'll see what I can find out," Gunther promises.

Inola shakes her head. "Can we move onto something else now?"

"How are we on the pipes?" Carol asks.

"Your old Kingdom plumber got them working again," Garland replies. "There was a freeze-up somewhere in the line. The museum has hot water again."

They talk about the difficulty of doing laundry, now that the river is frozen over, and how much they can reasonably do in the museum's machines without taxing its limited water and power supply. They make changes to the laundry rules and schedule to make sure everyone at least has clean underclothes.

"Everyone's just going to have to stink a little more than usual," Thomas says.

"Well, it's not like most of you are working up a sweat these days," Barry replies. "Hardly anyone's still working except the hunters."

"I assure you plenty are still working in the greenhouses and barns," Gunther tells him. "Laundry. Repairs. Everyone's working as much as they can given the circumstances."

"But only us bird hunters are _producing_ as much as always," Barry say proudly. "I mean, not even the deer hunters have caught anything lately!"

"Mitch and Daryl have a plan," Carol assures him. "They'll get something soon. But it's hard in the winter when the deer can see you coming."

"Do we need to lower meat rations?" Inola asks.

Garland flips through the papers in his folder. "I don't think so. We planned for a leaner winter. The smokehouses were well stocked. I'm sure Mitch and Daryl will catch something soon."

"Fruits and vegetables?" Carol asks.

"We're staying on track with our canned and jarred reserves," Garland says. "No adjustment needed there."

"We've put another third of the cows dry," Gunther says. "So milk rations are going to have to come down again." Carol's glad she took his advice and is waiting to wean Sweetheart from Shannon until the spring. "We should be able to get the cows out to grass by late February, and then we should be back to regular milk rations in mid-March. Egg production is down for the winter. We need to halve those rations again."

Garland makes notes in his folder.

"Some people are grumbling," Barry says, "because the rations are the same for everyone right now, even though not everyone is working their twenty anymore. Wasn't it Captain John Smith himself who said – "

"- He who does not work, does not eat," Thomas, Gunther, Dr. Ahmad, and Commander Witherspoon chorus together. Clearly this mantra goes back well before Carol's time in Jamestown.

Garland shuts his file folder. "I appreciate and understand the sentiment and the necessity of not allowing sloth. But this is only temporary. Everyone will be back to normal hours in a matter of weeks. Some things just can't be done in this weather."

"Fine," Barry says, "But when do those who are working right now get a vacation like all these other slackers?"

"Well you'll have a nice long vacation when you're off the council, won't you?" Gunther asks. "If you don't like working so much, you don't have to run next term."

Barry glowers. "I'm not talking about _me_. I'm talking about _other_ people I've heard grumbling."

"Well let them grumble," Garland says, "if they're grumbling keeps them warm."

"You of all people should understand the importance of not ignoring grumbling," Barry warns him.

"Fair enough," Garland concedes. "We should do something about it. But we can't afford to adjust food rations down and still ensure everyone has basic sustenance."

"Why don't we give those who are still working their twenty an extra five round of ammunition a week?" Carol suggests. "Just for the next two or three weeks, until it warms. Just so they feel like they're getting more for their efforts than people who are working much less?"

"I like it," Inola says.

"I don't know," Carolyn muses. "We don't have any ammo coming back into the armory right now because the tavern is closed and no one is spending it there. We don't have any brass to reload because no one is using the range in this weather. We get a few spent shell casings from the hunters, and that's it."

"But as soon as the tavern reopens," Carol reasons, "we'll recoup it. People will start spending again."

"I agree." Garland raises a hand. "All in favor?"

Seven more hands go up, and then, reluctantly, Carolyn's, too.

[*]

Daryl's breath floats in thick clouds on the forest air, rising from his winter ghillie suit, so it looks like the dead twigs are smoking. Beside him, Mitch, also lying flat on his stomach, whispers, "approaching" and inches his finger toward the trigger of his wooden Winchester rifle.

The elk arrives and lowers its head to feast on the bait of acorns they've laid out. A bolt wooshes into its neck, and a bullet hits its side, but the creature takes off running. Mitch, skinny as he is, with so little weight to lift from the ground, is the first on his feet. They're a couple of rustling, twiggy monsters running through the woods, slip sliding on the snow, but they get off two more successful shots that slows the animal considerably.

Daryl skates over a patch of ice, pinwheels, and stomps his boot down to steady himself in a pile of snow. Something seizes his ankle, and he aims his bow instinctively downward. When the surface of the snow begins to split, he shoots before the walker's head emerges.

Mitch comes to a panting stop beside him. "It'll fall soon."

"Yeah," Daryl agrees as he yanks out his arrow. "Avoid the drift piles. Might be walkers under 'em." He points with his arrow.

"I have been. What did you stomp in it for?"

"Slid into it."

They follow the tracks through the woods, careful to stay away from patches of deeper snow. Afternoon sunlight glints from the thin icicles on the barren trees.

"I thought I was going to freeze my ass off back there," Mitch mutters.

"Need more fat on yer ass."

"Yeah, well, I don't have a good woman to feed me like you do."

"Commander can't cook?"

Mitch snorts. "Well, he actually did use to work in the mess hall when he first enlisted. But I wouldn't call that quality cooking."

The leg of Daryl's ghillie suit gets caught up on some debris rising from the snow. He shakes it off. "Hate winter huntin'. All the sittin' 'n hidin' and waitin'."

"The suits worked, though," Mitch says. "Carol did a great job with them. I don't think he saw us at all until we shot."

The tracking takes another twenty minutes, but they find the weakened elk fallen, and Daryl promptly puts it out of its misery. It's the first thing they've caught in two weeks, other than a few fox squirrels. Barry and the other bird hunters have started making them look like amateurs, because they're still bringing back a good amount of grouse and crow. But an elk this size will yield at least 190 pounds of quality, boneless red meat after butchering. "Ain't never seen an elk in these woods before."

"There used to be a bunch in Virginia in the 19th century," Mitch tells him as Daryl yanks out his arrows. "But overhunting killed them off faster than they could reproduce. So in the early 1920s, they imported them back in from west of the Mississippi. But they were never re-introduced this far east in Virginia. They must be migrating now that everything's killed off."

"Hope we didn't kill the only stud," Daryl murmurs as he crouches and begins field dressing the animal. His numb hands are warmed by the blood.

Mitch joins him. Daryl is wiping his nose with the scratchy arm of his ghillie suit when Mitch asks, "So, what are you doing for Carol for Valentine's Day tonight?"

It takes Daryl a minute to process the words. He knows the calendar is somewhere near the middle of February at the moment. Carol has one tacked to the wall of the cabin that the lower school kids made. They prepared one for each of the council members, and Carol marks off the days as they pass with a thick slash of her pencil. But he doesn't pay much mind to specific dates, and he hasn't heard anyone mention Valentine's Day since sometime before the collapse of the world. "Shit," he mutters. "Y'all still do that here?"

Mitch laughs.


	151. Chapter 151

Using the side of his fist, Daryl smashes the thin layer of ice over the top of the water in the washing trough near the butcher's table. It shatters into a thousand pieces like one of those cheap, thin Cornell plates his mother use to have. Dog sits patiently at his heels while the butcher's wife pours a kettle of water into the trough and then uses a wooden paddle to mix the hot water with the cold.

"Thanks, Norma." Daryl plunges his hands into the now lukewarm water to scrub up. His ghillie suit and gloves lie discarded on the ground. Mitch joins him, and both wash away the blood of the hunt.

The butcher's cleaver comes down hard on the table. "This will make really good meat. Are there more elk out there?"

"I guess we'll find out tomorrow," Mitch tells him.

"You boys be careful," Norma says. "I've heard there's already been two cases of frostbite!" She looks him up and down now, and her eyes settle on the black stocking cap on his head. "I'm glad to see you've finally got the sense to cover your ears."

Mitch chuckles.

"You know," Norma continues, "last time this year it was up to fifty-five degrees in the afternoon by now! All the snow was gone, and Gunther had the cattle out grazing." She shakes her head. "It's going to be reduced rations until April at this rate!"

"That's a lovely necklace, Norma," says Mitch. He smirks and eyes Daryl as he continues, "Did Jeff give you that for _Valentine's Day_?"

Daryl glowers while he dries his hands with a towel.

"I bought it from the storehouse," the butcher says. "I just wish the tavern were open and I could take my fine woman out for a lovely dinner." He winks at his wife. "You want these?" the butcher asks Daryl as he separates the antlers.

"Yeah. Clean 'em up for me 'n leave 'em by my doorstep?"

"Sure."

There's no smoke coming from the cabin when Daryl gets home, so Carol must not be done with her council meeting and Sweetheart is no doubt with Shannon. He opens the outdoor deacon's bench below the front window. It cracks and creaks as a bit of ice breaks free, and he tucks his ghillie suit inside. He opens the door, and Dog barks, patters inside, and crawls under his wool blanket on the rug in Sweetheart's bedroom. "Be back," Daryl promises him and closes the door.

He'd like to go inside and start the fire and warm up, but he figures he better get something for Carol first. There's jewelry galore in that storehouse, but Carol doesn't need or want anymore jewelry. She only ever wears that Cherokee rose wedding ring. She put on the heart pendant necklace he got her for Christmas a couple of times, just around the house, but that was it.

He can't really blame her. Jewelry doesn't cost most, and so most of the time it doesn't mean anything. Besides, it can get hung up on stuff. You could get choked, lose a finger.

He spies Raul repairing a hinge on the shutter of his father's cabin in the distance and strolls over. "Still fixin' shit up even though ya don't live here?"

Raul takes a screw out of his mouth to speak. "My dad's paying me in ammo. He knows I get nervous if I can't make extra food rations, and the council's cut those off for winter to make sure everyone's fed. But I can buy more food in the spring with the ammo I earn doing this."

"How ya likin' the dorm?" Daryl asks.

"It's nice having my own room, especially now that Sarah's here." As he screws in the hinge, Raul continues, "Wouldn't want to have to listen to _that_ all night. The walls of the dorm are well insulated. You can't hear much. Have you been inside it?"

"Nah."

"You should check it out. Inola and Dante designed it really well. They should have been architects in the old world."

They're all something more in this world, Daryl thinks, something bigger and more important than they ever thought they could be.

"The rooms are arranged around three different suites," Raul continues. "And each suite has its own communal kitchen, wood stove, living room, and fireplace, so people hang out sometimes. It's nice. Gunther's in my suite, and Dwight and Sherry, too, so at least I knew some of my suitemates already."

Daryl forgets sometimes that Raul shared a camp with Dwight and Sherry for a couple of years. "Who else?"

"Deputy Thomas. Nick, you know, he also used to date Kelly before she settled on Harry. This Kingdom woman Eileen. I guess you know her. She's dating a guy in another suite, so she's not even in ours half the time."

Daryl figures he's made enough small talk, so it won't be rude to ask now. "Listen, uh…was wonderin'. Ya still got that bottle of wine ya got for your finder's fee when we found the pirates' booze?"

"No. I shared that with Enid when she was here."

"Damn," Daryl mutters.

"Why?"

"Just, 's Valentine's Day. Didn't know. Ain't got shit for Carol."

"They celebrate that here?" Raul asks skeptically.

"Seems like. So I guess she's gonna 'spect something."

Raul tucks his screwdriver back into the heavy brown toolbelt beneath his suede, wool-lined jacket.

A boy, maybe nine years old, is headed in their direction. He wears a thick, red winter coat, hand-knitted mittens, and a blue hat with a green ball on top. "Hey, misters!" he calls as he jogs over to them, his boots leaving muddy brown prints in the snow. School's been out for "winter break" until it warms up a bit more, because the schoolhouse isn't well heated, and with fewer people out working in the cold, there are more at home to watch the kids.

The boy comes to a stop before the cabin and thrusts out his arm. In his mittened hand he clutches eight plastic red roses. "A flower for your girl for Valentine's Day? Just one round of ammunition!"

"Hell ya get those?" Daryl asks.

"I bought them from the storehouse. You can find _anything_ in there."

"I guess so," Raul says. "I wonder why Jamestown would have kept _those_."

"Wedding decorations," the boy says. "For the chapel. But I bought them fair and square."

"How much ya buy 'em for?" Daryl asks.

The kid shrugs. "A round of ammo for a dozen."

"And you're sellin' 'em for a round _each_?" Daryl asks. "Damn big mark up." And it looks like the kid's already managed to sell four.

"What can I say? I'm an entrepreneur. You better have something for your girls, misters."

"My girl's a couple hundred mile away," Raul says. "So I'll pass."

The little salesman turns his attention to Daryl instead. "What do you say, mister? Just one round of ammo. Come on. The couch can't be that comfortable!"

Daryl chuckles. ""S yer name, kid?"

"Lucas."

"Well, Lucas, tell ya what. I'll buy one." Daryl doesn't know if it's going to appease Carol, but he admires the kid's hustle. When he was that age, he used to try to do anything he could to turn a buck. He'd spend hours collecting bottles and aluminum cans down by the creek to turn them into the grocery store's recycling center for just a few dollars. Once he shoplifted half a dozen candy bars from the Circle K and resold them on the school playground. He's not as proud of that one. It got him a week's in-school detention and a beating from his father – not because he stole, but because he got caught.

Daryl pulls off his glove with his teeth, flips back his poncho, and then slides his handgun out of his holster. He racks it back to expel the bullet that's already chambered. The boy crouches and scoops it up from the ground as Daryl holsters his gun.

Lucas slides the payment in his coat pocket before handing Daryl a rose. "Good luck, mister," the boy says. "Hope you get laid!" And then he jogs off.

Daryl laughs. "How _old_ is that kid?"

"Nine maybe," Raul says with a smile. "Better watch out for him in seventeen years, when Sweetheart's eighteen and he's twenty-six."

Daryl frowns. "Why are people always jokin' 'bout that shit? M'girl's gonna grow up to be a nun. Plain 'n simple."

"You're not even religious."

"Yeah, well, Carol's Catholic." A sudden thought occurs to Daryl. "Think they got rosaries in the storehouse? With all that jewelry?"

"I wouldn't be surprised."

Carol had one at some point. It always seemed to Daryl she used it to calm herself, like some kind of fidget toy. He's not sure she was even praying. But she _did_ use it. It did _something_ for her. But that rosary got lost along the way, like so many people and things.

[*]

When Carol, with Sweetheart on her hip, opens the cabin door, Dog is home but Daryl's not. That's curious. She sets the little girl down and helps her shrug out of her hat, mittens, jacket, and boots. Carol sheds her outer coat and then her colonial cloak and hangs both on the coat rack by the door. Sweetheart toddles off to her bedroom – she went from taking three to four tentative steps at a time to practically running in a single month – and hugs Dog. "Code, code!" she says when he licks her nose.

"It _is_ cold," Carol agrees. "I'll get the fire started in a minute."

"Code, code! Daaaawg!"

[*]

Something smells damn good when Daryl gets home. And it's warm in the cabin. Both the fireplace _and_ the wood stove are going. "Hey," he murmurs as he hangs up his bow.

Carol is sitting at the table writing in the _My First Year_ book while Sweetheart naps on the bear skin rug before the gated-off fire, one arm slung around a similarly sleeping Dog. "Ain't her first year anymore," Daryl says.

"I know, but there are blank pages in the back, so I'm journaling. She said dog today."

"Serious? Kid's a damn genius! Book says - " He stops when Carol laughs. "Well, it _does_ say only five words!"

"There's a range, Pookie. A wide range of normal."

"Yeah, range is three to five words. 'N she's got mama, dadda," he counts them off one by one of her fingers, "cold, uh-oh, wooh, dog, no…cold…what 'm forgettin'?"

"To take off your boots before you track mud into the kitchen."

Daryl sighs, returns to the door, and strips off his boots, which he lines up next to hers and Sweetheart's. Then, with his back still toward her, he flips off his poncho, drapes it casually on the coat rack, and takes out the plastic rose he tucked into his belt loop. He comes over and sets it down across the open pages of the baby book.

"What's….this?"

"Ya don't like flowers?"

"I do. I do like flowers." She picks it up and smells it. "It has a lovely plastic aroma."

"Pfft. Ya can use it to decorate or some shit. Ya like to decorate, right?"

She's still looking a bit bewildered. "Have you done something you shouldn't have?"

"What? No. Hell would I of done?"

"I don't know. This is just kind of out of character for you. But thank you." She stands, kisses him on the cheek, lays the rose across the mantle, and then returns to the kitchen to check on the stew on the stove top. "What's it for?" she asks as she stirs.

"Ya don't know?"

"Know what?" she asks.

"Shiiiiit!"

Carol looks up from the pot and gives him a very confused look.

"Guess I didn't need to spend a damn hour findin' this neither then?" He fishes the rosary out of his pant's pocket. It's ornately carved with brown wood beads and a black wicker chain. He dangles it from the palm of his hand.

The spoon clatters against the side of the pot as Carol hastens over to him. She takes it from his hand. "It's beautiful! You know I lost mine a few years ago."

"Yeah. Know."

She laughs. "I was going to try to find another one, and I just…I never got around to it." She caress the wooden cross at the bottom and then runs her fingers over the beads. "Thank you." She wraps it around her wrist and then kisses him on the lips. When she pulls back, she asks, "So why are you being so sweet to me all of the sudden?"

"Ain't I always sweet to ya?"

"Yeah. But not usually gift-giving sweet."

"'S Valentine's Day."

Carol snorts. She covers her mouth with her rosary-wrapped hand. "Are you serious? _You_ celebrate Valentine's Day?"

"Assumed ya would want me to when ya found out all the other women are gettin' shit from their men."

"Shannon didn't mention it." Carol unwinds the rosary and hangs it from a hook on the hutch. "But I appreciate the gifts. Especially the rosary. It was very thoughtful. I'll use it for sure." She returns to stirring the stew. "The only gift I have for you is this rabbit stew."

He wraps his arms around her from behind and nuzzles her neck. "Let it stew," he murmurs. "Kid's asleep. I can think of a gift ya can give me."

Carol chuckles. "I don't know. She'll be up in a few minutes."

"Been awhile." This time, he's not exaggerating. With Sweetheart climbing into their bed every night to avoid the cold, it _has_ been awhile. He kisses her earlobe. "C'mon. Let me warm ya up."

Carol efficiently taps the spoon against the pot, then lays it on the counter, and sets the lid on. She takes his hand and tugs him to their bedroom, where she quickly pulls the drapes. He was fully expecting her to laugh off his request, so he laughs with boyish excitement when she pulls a pillow off their bed and tosses it on the floor before his feet. He knows what that means, or at least he thinks he does. When she seizes him by the belt buckle and starts undoing it with a clang, he's _sure_ he knows what it means. "Oh, hell yeah!"

"This has to be quick," she says. "She only power naps these days." She jerks his zipper down. "Think you can be quick?"

"Uh huh," he manages as she slides his pants and long johns down, sliding herself down with them until her knees touch the pillow. He swallows hard and closes his eyes fast when her mouth abruptly surrounds him. "Oh holy fuck!" He puts one hand on her shoulder to steady himself, and another on the back of her head to urge her on.

Next Valentine's Day, he thinks, he's going to bring her _two dozen_ plastic roses.

[*]

Daryl's half asleep that night when Carol tickles him awake, her fingers on that vulnerable spot she discovered along his rib cage. He swats her away. "Cut it out!"

"It's my turn," she whispers.

"What?"

"It's my turn. You didn't get to reciprocate this afternoon because Sweetheart woke up."

He rolls on his back and rubs his eyes. The fire glows low in the fireplace. It's not cold, he realizes. For the first night in many nights, the long johns and blankets and fire are enough. In fact, he feels a little warm. Sweetheart might actually stay in her own bed tonight.

"Come on," Carol teases, deepening her voice in imitation of him, "Been awhile."

"Pfft." He flips her abruptly on her back and yanks down the bottoms of her long johns.

" _Slowly_ ," she tells him.

"A'right. Gonna take my sweet time." He nibbles her neck until she squirms and then begins working his way gradually down.

[*]

Carol shudders from her climax and tries to push Daryl's head forcefully away as he continues to tease her with his tongue past her point of tolerance. It might the push, or it might be the knock on the door, but he abruptly jerks his head away. She's breathing hard when he emerges from underneath the blanket.

"What the hell?" she manages. "It's the middle of the night."

Daryl rolls out of the bed. He's still dressed in his off-white long john's, though he's got a throbbing erection now that tents the flap. "Someone better be dead," he mutters. He throws open the drapes around their bed and takes his hunting knife off the mantle. It rasps free from the sheath, which he returns to the mantle beside the plastic rose. Carol pulls the blankets back up to her neck as he answers the door.

Through the open drapes, she can see Sheriff Earl in the doorway. He wears a long, black overcoat flung over his own long johns, and it looks like he's shoved his bare feet hastily into his boots. She thinks it must be sheriff's business, that perhaps he needs her to break up a fight, so she begins to sit up. But then Earl says, "Ana's in labor. It happened so suddenly. The midwife said something's wrong. Something's wrong. Something's wrong!"

"Calm down, man," Daryl tells him. "'S wrong?"

"I don't know. We need a doctor up here. Fast. A _real_ doctor. Dr. Emily. Dr. Ahmad. One of them. She might need an emergency C-section. Does your motorcycle still have gas?"

"Hold tight. I'll get m'bike 'n get 'em."

Daryl shuts the door, grabs his pants off the back of the couch where he flung them earlier tonight, and yanks them on.


	152. Chapter 152

Daryl's motorcycle roars between cabins and bursts through the opening in the fort's fence and onto the path leading down to the docks. It's a slippery ride over the four inches or so of icy snow that coats the ground, and he almost wipes out twice, but manages to jerk the bike upright and keep on riding. He skids to an abrupt stop outside the museum doors and kicks down the stand. The young night guard, Nick, bursts outside in response to the noise, his hand on the butt of his handgun, holster unsnapped, ready to draw. He sighs with relief when he sees it's Daryl, but then says, "It's way past curfew!"

"Need the doctor. Ana's baby's comin'."

Nick holds the door open for Daryl while he runs inside. It's dark in the museum, and Nick turns on his solar-powered flashlight and sweeps the beam to light Daryl's way down the hallway. The infirmary alone glows with light, but neither doctor is on duty tonight. Thomas-the councilman, deputy, and field medic-is there instead. "Something wrong?" he asks.

"Ya ever done a C-section?"

"What? No. I – "

Daryl moves on, past the open doorway of the infirmary, and turns to pound on the door across from it instead. Emily's husband Dan flings open the door. "Need the doc," Daryl demands.

"Emily!" Dan cries as he lets the door fall shut.

[*]

Daryl's more careful on the ride back up to the fort, because now his adrenaline has stopped pumping quite so hard, and he's got the presence of mind to realize if he wipes out and injures the doctor, Ana and the baby are both in trouble. He tries to stay in the smooth tracks made by the sleigh the horses pull to drag things and people about the town in wintertime. He's turning from the docks onto the path that leads up to the fort and village when Deputy Andrew, who's apparently on foot patrol, comes running down toward the unexpected night noise. The deputy steps back abruptly out of the way as Daryl flies past.

He eases the bike to a stop in front of Earl's cabin. The door is flung open, and Ana's inside on her bed, screaming. The dividing wall still stands between their two halves of the cabin. It never did come down, despite their attempts at reconciliation. The midwife is in there, too, with clean towels draped over her shoulder, pouring hot water from a kettle into a bucket of well-drawn water. Dr. Emily dismounts and, black bag in hand, hastens inside.

[*]

"Wish I hadn't said that," Daryl mutters as, slouched on the couch, he stares into the flames of the fire. The sun is slowly rising over Jamestown.

Carol laces her fingers through his and squeezes his hand. "Said what?"

"Someone better be dead."

Carol kisses his shoulder, and her gut twists with concern for him. "You didn't mean it," she whispers. "And you did everything you could do. So did Emily."

Dr. Emily managed to save the baby, but not the mother.

Daryl lets out a long, wary sigh. Little feet slap-slap-slap over the wood floor. Sweetheart, who has quietly crawled out of her bed, throws herself against his legs and looks up at him. "Dada! Up. Dada, up!"

He lifts her up onto his lap and hugs her tightly, burying his face in the light brown waves of her hair.

[*]

By afternoon, the weather has warmed over ten degrees compared to the past week. The snow has begun to melt in muddy streams down the path that leads to the docks, and water drips off rooftops. People stand huddled at the graveyard as Jamestown's rabbi reads from his frayed, open Bible: "I lift my eyes to the mountains; what is the source of my help? My help comes from Adonai, maker of heaven and earth…"

Sheriff Earl, dressed in black slacks and a charcoal gray button-down shirt, which is cut on the right side as an expression of grief, drives the blade of the shovel into the wet earth and then lets the mud slide slowly down onto the newly lowered coffin.

[*]

Sheriff Earl Carter names the baby boy Benjamin, perhaps as an echo of the Bible story in which Rachel dies giving birth. The six-pound, eight-ounce boy is tow-headed, blue-eyed, and fair skinned. It's obvious to all who see him that Captain David Cummins was the father. But Earl only says, "I think he has my chin."

The teenage newlywed Olivia volunteers to be a wet nurse. She's due to give birth in a month and half herself and has already begun leaking prematurely. Earl wants to be close to his son (because that what he calls Benjamin), so he asks if the couple will move into his cabin. The dividing wall is still up. They can have Ana's old half, he tells them, with its wood stove and kitchen nook and bedroom. It's bigger than their bedroom in that small office that used to be the library.

Olivia's young husband Jeremy says no. Given what happened to Ana, he wants to stay put where they are – just around the corner from the doctors' bedrooms and the infirmary and all its medical supplies.

It's probably for the best. As much as Earl wants to step up and play father, he's in mourning, and he's a mess. Jeremy and Olivia promise, however, that they'll move into his cabin a couple weeks after their own baby is born. They'll want the extra space then and the extra help. In the meantime, Earl can visit the baby as often as he likes.

[*]

The temperature rises another ten degrees the next day. The council, much to the children's groaning, announces that school will re-open next week.

The tavern takes down its closed sign, and Candy returns to her bedroom in the loft. Linda does, too, even though Ernesto has invited her to move in permanently to his small cabin. But Linda likes the convenience of living above her own business, "and maybe I like my freedom, too," she admits to Carol, who has come with Gunther for a quick drink after the latest council meeting. Gunther's drinking iced tea, but Carol's splurging on one of Linda's exceptional Manhattans. She needs a good stiff drink after the events of this week.

"But it's going well?" Carol asks.

"Oh, I enjoy his company," Linda says. "And he makes me feel attractive. Desired. I can't tell you the last time I felt _that_ way."

Candy sets down three rounds of ammo on the bar. "We've only got three customers, and Gunther doesn't count. So I'm taking my break." She pulls herself a pint and walks off to the opposite end of the bar to sit down next to one of Jamestown's fishermen, who will probably end up buying her a second beer.

Linda puts a hand on the bar and leans toward Gunther. "She came back from that dorm with her pockets full of ammunition."

"I know," Gunther says warily.

"I know she never stopped _completely_ ," Linda half whispers, "but I think she was being more discrete and selective before this winter. I'm worried about her."

"So am I," Gunther admits.

Linda sighs. "I wish she'd settled down with a nice man like Trisha did."

"I don't know how _nice_ Deputy Andrew is," Gunther murmurs.

Carol raises an eyebrow as she sips her Manhattan.

"What do you mean by that?" Linda asks.

"He applied to be on that trade trip a couple weeks after he married her. What do you think he was hoping to find on that trip?"

Linda shrugs. "Maybe he just wanted the adventure."

"With a newlywed wife back at home?" Gunther asks. "I think I'd be having my adventure in Jamestown."

"He hasn't cheated on her," Linda insists.

"I think that's more from lack of opportunity than anything else," Gunther mutters. "But she loves him, and he doesn't hurt her. He puts a roof over her head. I just think she deserves better. After all she's been through, she deserves someone as crazy about her as she is about him." He looks around. "Where is Trisha anyway?"

"She called in sick today. Some sort of stomach bug. Nothing serious, I hope." Linda shakes her head. "Last thing we need is another bout of the flu. We lost too many last fall."

Gunther sighs. "We manage to lose people just fine without the flu. Poor Ana. Poor Earl. Poor little Benjamin."

"At least this is only the second death we've had in an _entire_ year," Linda replies.

Carol jumps when a hand falls on her shoulder. She spills a tiny splash of her Manhattan and instinctively reaches for her knife with her free hand, which stills on the hilt when Daryl mutters, "Don't stab me, Beautiful."

Carol smiles and sets her drink down as Daryl pulls out a stool and sits down beside her. "Gunther buy you that drink?"

Carol peers at him cautiously. He hasn't shown any jealousy over Gunther in a long time. "No."

Daryl looks at Gunther, who sits around the curve of the bar from them. "Why not, man? Ain't my wife worth a drink?"

"Fine, put it on my tab."

Carol chuckles when she realizes Daryl was only joking. "We have plenty of ammo," she says. She gets five extra rounds a week as a deputy, but the firing range was closed for three weeks due to the weather, so she has more stored up than usual. "Put Gunther's tea on _my_ tab."

"Then put Daryl's drink on mine," Gunther replies. "Whiskey. Neat. Tullamore DEW."

"We're out of that," Linda replies.

"Then Jameson's," Gunther says.

Carol turns her head to Daryl. "I think Gunther knows you better than _I_ do."

"Just what I drink."

"Catch anything out there?" Carol asks.

Daryl mutters a thank you as Linda slides him the whiskey. "Got us a cow."

"A cow?" asks Gunther, voice rising.

"'S what ya call a female elk. Don't worry. Ain't huntin' yer cows."

"So there are enough out there for you to keep hunting them?" Carol asks.

"Found a small herd with 'bout dozen cows 'n two bulls. Just got the one. Gonna leave 'em alone now, 'til September, after they breed and the calves are weaned. Just hope they stay in the area."

"After this drink," Carol tells him, "I'm going to go see Earl. He's sitting shiva. Will you pick up Sweetheart from Shannon's?"

Daryl nods. Santiago has taken over as acting Sheriff once again, for just a week, so Earl can have his time of mourning.

"I didn't even know Earl was Jewish," Linda admits.

"I knew Ana was," Gunther says. "I just didn't know _he_ was. I thought he was just playing along for her."

"Maybe he still is," Linda says. "In honor of her memory. Although they never did fully reconcile, did they?"

"I just hope it helps him," Carol says. "The ritual."

[*]

Carol brings Earl a casserole she made. It gives her weird flashbacks to Alexandria, even though there's no faking this time. He's on Ana's side of the cabin, where a few folding chairs are set out, which Garland brought up from the museum. Garland's sitting in one now. A second is occupied by the rabbi, Adam. They've probably been here a few hours, because they look relieved when she shows up and rise to make their departure now that there's another visitor.

Earl stands up from the low, overturned crate he's been sitting on. Carol supposes that's symbolic of something, but she doesn't dare ask what. Garland embraces Earl, whispers something in his ear, and pats his back. The rabbi says he'll return later and departs with the blessing, "May God comfort you among the other mourners of Zion and Jerusalem."

Carol's not quite sure what she's supposed to do or say, but fortunately Earl takes the casserole from her hands and thanks her. "I didn't even want to think about making dinner. This is kind of you." He sets it on the counter near the wood stove and with a wave of his hand urges her to sit. A thick fuzz of dark stubble lines his cheeks, and his near-black eyes are clouded with exhaustion. Carol doesn't think he's been sleeping much. She lets him initiate the conversation, and they talk for a good half hour about nothing of significance. But eventually Earl opens up and admits, "I don't know how I'm supposed to feel, Carol. I was still angry at her when she died. Angry, but…I still loved her, too."

"There's no _supposed_ to," Carol tells him gently. "Just feel whatever you feel."

He lets out a trembling sigh. "Part of me feels _relieved_. I was trying to make our marriage work. To let go. To forgive. And it was so hard. It was _so_ hard. And now...I don't have to try anymore. And I feel _relieved_. And that's what I feel most guilty about. I feel guilty about the anger. But I feel even guiltier about the relief. And then the sorrow comes like a mighty wave and washes away all the anger, guilt, and relief for a while."

"I know what you mean."

"How would you?" Earl asks.

"I know it's not the same…betrayal and abuse are not the same, but my first husband, before Daryl, before King Ezekiel – my first husband abused me. And when he died, I had a similar mix of feelings."

"How did you get any relief from them?"

Carol thinks it's better not to tell him about Daryl warily handing her the axe and watching her while she hacked into Ed.

"How did you make the feelings stop?" Earl asks.

"I didn't. You don't make them stop. But one day…they just do."

"When you find someone else, you mean?" Earl asks.

"No, that's not why." She doesn't want to tell him that her conflicting torrent of feelings about Ed were buried when far worse losses followed.

"No? You had your king, and now you have Daryl. That can't hurt. But I don't think I'll have that luxury."

"You never know, Earl. You're young yet. What? Thirty - "

"- six."

"There's time."

"But few women." He leans forward, elbow on his knees, and sighs. "And I'm a father now. Benjamin will be my priority. He's all I have left of her." He sits straight again. "He has my nose, don't you think?"

"Yes," Carol lies. "He does."

[*]

That next afternoon, Carol takes the notebook from Santiago in the jailhouse, flips through it, and asks, "No problems to deal with?"

"It was too cold for trouble for a while, but it's warming up. I'd watch out if I were you. People have a lot of pent-up energy to let loose now."

It's up to fifty-five degrees when she starts her rounds. Through the north gate of the fort, Gunther, on horseback, with the help of Dog and a second dog, is herding the cows out to pasture.

The long winter is finally over.


	153. Chapter 153

"Milk production should be back to normal within two weeks," Gunther says as Thomas scribbles notes in the council minutes.

"When are we expecting the mail team from Oceanside?" Garland asks.

"They said sometime in March, after the thaw," Carol replies. "So it could be any day now. We don't have a specific date."

"Tell the light house guards to keep a lookout then."

"The pregnant women are scared," Inola says. "They're worried that all the medical personnel are too far from the fort and village."

"Ana didn't die because Dr. Emily got there too late," Dr. Ahmad says. "Everything was done that could have been done in the infirmary."

"We all know there's a real risk of death in childbirth in this day and age." Inola rests a hand on her own pregnant stomach.

"No higher than in the 19th century," Dr. Ahmad insists.

"Well, it was pretty high then, wasn't it?" Commander Witherspoon asks.

"One percent," Dr. Ahmad says. "Maybe two."

"That's plenty high," Carol assures him.

"I don't want pregnant women to be worrying about this," the doctor insists. "The stress isn't healthy. I don't want them thinking childbirth is more dangerous than it actually is."

"They already think it's dangerous!" Inola exclaims. "A woman just died!"

"Thomas is in the dormitory now," Barry says, "which is on the side parking lot of the museum. _You_ have a room in one of the old museum offices. So does Dr. Emily. You're all here." He stabs his finger down on the council chamber table. "Almost a mile from the nearest cabin or hut. It's not just about pregnant women. What if my wife falls off the roof and breaks her leg or something?"

"Why would your wife be on your roof?" Carolyn asks.

"If she's repairing something."

"You make your wife do that?"

"Or whatever! If _I_ fall off the roof! If my daughter gets bit by some rabid animal. I don't know! Anything! No one's up there."

"Carolyn's in the village," Thomas says.

"She's a veterinarian," Barry says. "Not a _people_ doctor."

"I hate to say Barry has a point," Gunther says. "But he does. Maybe one of you _should_ be living in the village or fort. There's no transportation down here either. The horses are up in the stables. Daryl's motorcycle is in the fort. You've got bicycles and a rickshaw down here, but that's it. Those aren't very fast. We should have a doctor or medic up there."

"Thomas, perhaps you should move back to the barracks," Dr. Ahmad suggests.

"Great. Why me? Why not you."

"You're _used_ to living there," the doctor replies. "And I have a wife who won't want to move."

"Shouldn't we have a doctor up there? I'm just a medic."

"You're very capable," Dr. Ahmad insists. "You've certainly saved your share of lives."

"The barracks will be huge with just you," Gunther assures him.

"You could turn it into an apartment of sorts," Inola suggests. "Make a bedroom in one half, and then a kitchen and living room where the fireplace is. Dante will help you make dividing walls if you want them, a hutch and table for the kitchen, whatever you need."

"It's twice the size of your current apartment," Gunther notes.

Thomas sighs. "And if we take in refugees, you'll just put them in there with me, won't you?"

"I don't see why," Dr. Ahmad says. "We'll have your room free in the dormitory, Jeremy and Olivia's room free in the museum once they move into Earl's cabin after their baby is born, _and_ the room the Kingdom women vacated is still empty."

"I thought we were reserving that in case we need it for quarantine," Thomas says.

"Thank you for volunteering to move into the barracks, Thomas," says Garland, as though he'd already agreed. "I truly appreciate you taking one for the team. Now we'll have both Dr. Emily and Dr. Ahmad near the museum and dormitory, you in the fort, and Carolyn in the village. Full coverage. I'll help you get your things moved in after the meeting."

Thomas throws up a hand. "Fine."

"Bob and Mary filed for divorce," Carol says. "Finally." After years of fighting, at the advice of the marriage counselor they've been seeing, they're finally calling it quits. "The court gave her the hut, so he needs a living reassignment."

"And what do you know?" Garland says. "A room in the dorms just opened up."

Thomas sighs. He makes a note of the room reassignment in the council minutes.

"Which brings us to another matter of business," Garland continues. "We need to appoint a new, permanent judge now that Ana's…" He grits his teeth. "No longer with us."

"The apprentice?" Carol asks. "Annette?"

"She's young," Barry says. "She just turned nineteen."

"But she's been trained in court procedure since she was thirteen," Carol insists. "And she's been filling in for the last three weeks since Ana died. She presided over Bob and Mary's divorce case. She also filled in on Earl's assault case, too, back when there was a conflict of interest. Who else would we appoint?"

"The prosecutor," Barry says. "He knows all the court procedures. He has an apprentice who could fill his shoes if we make him judge."

"You just don't want a woman to be the head of the courts, do you?" Carolyn asks.

"I'm saying she's _nineteen_. That's a big job for a teenager."

"Just because your daughter is immature and breaks into the brewhouse to get drunk doesn't mean all teenagers are that way," Carolyn insists.

"You wouldn't know! You've never raised a teenager!" Barry points to his head. "Their brains aren't developed. None of you know what it's like to raise one. None of you!"

Carol raises an eyebrow.

"I met Carol's teenage son at Oceanside," Carolyn says. "He seemed mature to me. And his teenage wife is in the _government_. She's an advisor to the Chieftain."

"I've raised teenagers," Gunther tells him. "Three of them. My twins were eighteen when the Great Sickness erupted. The younger one was thirteen."

"I didn't know," Barry says, sounding slightly contrite. "But would you have put them in charge of a court system?"

"I put the older ones in charge of the farm whenever I was sick or injured," Gunther reasons.

"All in favor of appointing Annette permanently to the position of judge?" Garland asks.

Eight hands go up. Barry shakes his head but then raises his hand.

"We should appoint a new judge apprentice then," Garland announces.

"Can it be a male this time?" Barry asks.

Garland eyes him warily, but says, "I was actually thinking of the orphan Oliver. He's finished his schooling, just turned thirteen, and needs to start his apprenticeship."

"What are his final graduation marks for the upper school subjects?" Inola asks.

Garland goes to get a file, and the door of the filing cabinet rolls shut with a clang as he sits down again. He pulls out a sheet of paper. "He got a C+ in Weapons, Martial Arts, Ironworking, Woodworking, and Construction. A B- in Engineering, Math, and Medicine. C's in Home Economics, Agriculture, Fishing, Hunting, and Animal Husbandry."

"Impressive," Carolyn says dryly.

"Hold on," Garland cautions. "He got an A+ in Civics and an A+ in Speech and Composition. That's why I think the courts would be a good match for him. That's clearly where his talent lies. Unless we make him a teacher."

"Not a math teacher," Inola says.

"Any comments from the teachers of the Civics seminars on his transcript?" Carol asks. In the upper school, there are no permanent teachers. People with other jobs cycle in and out to teach seminars in a variety of subjects in which they are skilled, and there is also some field observation and hands-on training.

"Before she died, Ana wrote – _Oliver has an exceptional command of the content of Jamestown's charter, and he would likely make an excellent prosecutor, defense attorney, or judge._ The prosecutor wrote that he had a passion for justice, and the defense attorney noted that he seems aware of the importance of the rights of citizens."

Carol nods. "Sounds good to me."

When Garland asks, "All in favor?" every hand goes up.

[*]

After the meeting, Gunther and Carol stroll together along the docks back toward the fort. Gunther is on his way to supervise the milking, while Carol needs to stop by the jailhouse before starting her patrol rounds. Two chattering, excited sailors run past them. Then a young guard runs by. Next come three fishermen. Finally, Captain McBride clatters down the ramp of the _Susan Constant_ as they're passing the ship and weaves around them before jogging down the docks.

"What's going on?" Gunther asks.

The men all pause at the edge of the dock and cheer and wave. "Roll back the gates!" Captain McBride booms, and two sailors begin to row out onto the water in a canoe.

Carol smiles. "I think the speedboat's here!"

Gunther and Carol quicken their pace and stand near the excited crowd of men. Carol can't see around the docked ships from her position, but she can soon hear the electric purr of Oceanside's speedboat. The sailors and fishermen eagerly help the boat to dock and then assist the women out, first the driver, who, if Carol remembers correctly, is named Charlotte, then Dianne, who tells them to "back off" and weaves between them to greet Gunther, then Enid, and finally Rosita. Seaman Taylor winks at Rosita and asks, "Remember me?"

"That's not happening again," Rosita says simply.

There's a chorus of _ooooo's_ from the other men.

"Not with Taylor _,_ maybe!" Seaman Harrison shouts, and all the men laugh, except Captain McBride, who is looking gloomily into the boat.

No one offers Henry a hand, and he scrambles onto the deck on his own.

"Where's Cyndie?" McBride asks him.

"She didn't come," Henry tells him after he pulls away from Carol's embrace. "She's got a lot of responsibilities at Oceanside. But she sent you a letter." He swings his satchel off his shoulder and opens the outer pocket and hands the captain a bundle of folded papers. "The names are all on the outside. Can you distribute them? I obviously don't know everyone. There's three for the mayor from the community leaders, one for Dr. Carolyn, and three for different seamen."

"None for Deputy Thomas?" Seaman Harrison asks. "I guess his two nights at Oceanside didn't go as well as he thought they did." Several of the men laugh.

"His two nights went just _fine_ ," Charlotte says thinly. "I brought _myself_ instead of a letter. Can you tell me where I can find him?"

"He's in the dorms," Gunther tells her. "Getting ready to move his things to the barracks. I'll show you in a minute when I take Dianne to drop her things in my room. I mean," he half bows his head, "if that's okay with you?"

"I assumed those would be the arrangements," Dianne replies with a slight smile.

"How long are you staying?" Gunther asks.

"Just one night," Dianne answers, "but we won't leave until after lunch tomorrow. Do you have to work?"

"A couple of hours. I was just headed to supervise the milking. But I'll get you settled first, and then I'll free up as much time in my schedule as I can. My boss Ernesto can probably take over my duties tomorrow morning."

"What brings you to Jamestown?" Carol asks Rosita.

Rosita shrugs. "The Hilltop and Oceanside were both being represented on this postal run. Alexandria didn't want to be left out. So I volunteered to come. Besides, I hear you have a tavern."

"I'll take you for a drink, gorgeous!" Seaman Harrison says.

"I think I can find my own way around, thanks," Rosita tells him.

Word of the speedboat's arrival must have traveled, because Raul, who has been working in one of the fields along the path, comes running down and onto the docks, a huge grin on his face. He clatters to a stop before Enid, which causes the fisherman who was trying to flirt with her to step away. Raul takes one of her hands in each of his. "You came again! I didn't think you would!"

"Why not?" she asks just before she steps in and kisses him on the cheek.

"Just…you being the doctor and all."

"Well, I _do_ have an apprentice. And I need more herbs. I'll probably need more in April, too."

Raul laughs happily. "I have my own dorm room now. You can stay there. I mean, I'll sleep on the floor. Or in the common room, if you want."

Enid steps in closer and whispers something in his ear, which makes him flush. Raul looks at Gunther and says, "I'm on the schedule to work until - "

"- Don't worry about it. I'll figure it out. Take the rest of the day and the morning off. I'll get you some extra hours at the end of the week. Go on and show Enid to the dorms."

Raul puts an arm around Enid's waist as they head down the docks and Gunther offers Dianne his arm. Dianne smiles at the gesture and laces her arm through his. Charlotte joins them to go find Thomas, and Henry and Carol, with Rosita by their side, and a trail of men behind them, begin walking toward the fort.

Rosita stops suddenly, turns around, and says, coolly, "Stop following me. _If_ I decide I want to socialize, and that's a _big_ if right now, maybe I'll find one of you."

The men freeze in place, smile nervously, and one literally takes a step backward.

As the three of them walk on alone, Henry says to Rosuita, "I guess you won't have any trouble finding a place to crash tonight."

"Henry!" Carol scolds him.

"What?" Rosita asks. "The kid's right. I won't. But I'm going to take my time to make a selection."

"Just avoid Seaman Harrison," Carol tells her.

"You think you have to tell me that? My tastes aren't that bad."

They run into Sheriff Earl just outside of the fort's fence. His gold sheriff's star sits askew over his left shirt pocket, and his brown hat is tipped haphazardly down over his dark eyes, but he's clean shaven. He's doing better now that three weeks have passed since Ana's death. "I see your son's here," he tells Carol. "You'll probably want to switch your patrol?"

"If possible."

"Talk to Santiago or Sarah. I'm sure one of them will switch with you." He notices Rosita, looks at her curiously, and holds out his hand, "I'm Sheriff Earl Carter."

"Sheriff?" she asks with a smirk. "Fancy." She extends her hand and shakes.

"You don't have a sheriff at Oceanside?"

"I'm from Alexandria, actually. And, no, we don't have a sheriff there. But we have a constable."

Earl smirks. "Oh, well, nothing fancy then. And you are?"

"Rosita Espinoza. Councilwoman Espinoza, if we're doing titles."

"Fancy."

Rosita chuckles. She settles a hand on her hip. "My council wants me to meet with your mayor. Can you show me to him, Sheriff?"

Earl points over her shoulder. "His office is in the direction you just came from. I'll walk you there. I was just headed that way to see my son. He's with his wet nurse."

Rosita turns around and begins walking back down the path with him, and Carol and Henry head on.


	154. Chapter 154

Henry is taking Carol out to dinner at the tavern, and he seems awfully proud of the fact, like a freshman NFL player who has just bought his mama a house. "Order anything you want," he insists after Trisha seats them. "Ammunition is no object."

"Well, Mr. Moneybags," Trisha tells him. "I hope tipping is no object either." She gives him a little wink. "Where's Daryl?"

"Someone has to watch Sweetheart," Carol tells her.

Trisha smiles skeptically. "So Mr. Mom is doing it?"

Henry laughs.

Trisha poises her pencil against her order pad. "What can I get y'all?"

"Well, since my son apparently won the lottery…" Carol looks over the chalk board with the day's specials. "I'll have the venison steak with corn and potatoes. And a pint of beer."

"I'll have a pint of beer and the rabbit stew," Henry tells her.

"When did you start drinking?" Carol asks as the waitress walks away.

"Mom, I'm seventeen. I'm not a little boy anymore."

"And where'd all the ammo come from?"

"Rosita had the idea we should stop and do some scavenging at this trailer park she spied in this clearing in the woods along the river. She was our lookout and was scouring the shore with binoculars. It had maybe thirty trailers. It looks like at the start, most of the people died and turned and the rest just fled. _Nothing_ was busted into, but a few of the trailers were partially cleared out by the people fleeing. I don't think they wanted to loot the ones with dead people inside. And I don't think anyone had been back there since the start."

"Really?"

"So I got to practice my walker slaying." Henry makes a sudden two-handed motion as if he's whipping a staff, which causes Carol to jump slightly. "Of course there was nothing worth salvaging food wise and this point, and the clothes were mostly moth eaten, but over half of the trailers had at least one gun and some ammo inside."

" _Over_ half?"

He nods. "I guess southeast Virginia is gun country. After we split the loot five ways, and even after the cut Dianne insisted we hold back for Oceanside's armory, my share is still a hundred rounds."

Carol whistles. "And how many guns?"

"Twenty total. We split them up between the three communities. None of them were in great shape, but we might strip them for parts."

Trisha returns and sets their pint glasses down. The shutters of the tavern creak open and Sheriff Earl walks inside with Rosita. Trisha goes to greet them and looks Rosita up and down. "Well, hello, and welcome to Jamestown! I suppose you're one of the Oceanside ladies?"

"I'm from Alexandria."

"Let me get you two a table."

"We're just going to sit at the bar," Earl says.

"Oh, no, oh no, you two need a table. A nice _private_ table in the corner."

"It's not like that," Earl says. "We're just talking shop. Rosita wants to know about our legal system."

"Mhmhm. Sounds _fascinating_. Right this way." Trisha begins leading them toward a two-person table in the far corner, not far from the fireplace. Rosita raises an eyebrow at Earl, but she follows Trisha, and soon they're seated a good distance from the rest of the customers.

"I guess Rosita's found her place to crash," Henry says.

"Oh, I don't think so," Carol replies. "Earl just lost his wife three weeks ago in childbirth."

"Oh. Poor guy." Henry shrugs and lifts his pint. "Could be good for the grief though."

"If Rachel died, would you be hopping into another woman's bed in three weeks?"

When Henry sets his pint glass down, he has a foamy mustache. He wipes it off with the back of his hand, a move that makes Carol wonder how many of Ezekiel's courtly manners he's managed to maintain since leaving the Kingdom. "You did."

"What?"

"Daryl was in the Kingdom three weeks after Dad died. He stayed in your chambers."

"He slept on the couch!"

"Yeah. Right."

"Henry, Daryl and I didn't get together that way until a year after your father died."

"Really? I know you didn't get _engaged_ until over a year after he died, but I assumed, whenever Daryl was visiting…"

"No!" Has Henry really thought this the entire time? That she was jumping into bed with Daryl once a month when he stopped by the Kingdom, starting _three weeks_ after she buried Ezekiel?

"Oh. Well…then…when did you? The first time?"

It's a weirdly intimate conversation to be having with one's _child_ , but given that he's married now and hasn't lived in the same community as her for some time, Carol supposes Henry is beginning to see her as more of a friend than a mother. "On that road trip. When we found Jamestown."

"I thought going on that trip just made you decide to get _engaged_. I didn't know that was the first time you two… _wait_. So you went straight from sex to getting engaged?"

"We actually got engaged first."

Henry snorts. "Yeah right."

"We did."

"Whatever." Henry smiles. "I thought you guys were on-and-off together and that me moving to Oceanside would speed up the process of Daryl moving to the Kingdom."

"It didn't bother you when you thought we were together?"

"It did and it didn't," he admits. "Part of me hated the thought of you replacing Dad, and part of me saw how sad you were and thought, maybe if Daryl moved to the Kingdom full-time, and you two _lived_ together, you wouldn't be so sad. I guess I should have said something."

"Maybe not. Maybe things worked out in their own time, when they needed to, and not a moment before."

The shutters creak open again and Santiago and Sarah saunter in and up to the bar, nodding to Carol on their way.

"I thought you were covering for Carol this evening?" Sheriff Earl calls from the table he shares with Rosita.

Santiago turns toward him on his stool. "Andrew took over for me. He wants the overtime, since he's got a baby coming." He grins at Trisha, who has come to take their order. "You've been keeping secrets."

Well that explains the stomach bug that kept Trisha out of work a few weeks ago, Carol thinks. It must have been morning sickness. Maybe all those jokes about there being something in the water are right. Olivia is due in April, Inola in July, and Dwight's wife, Sherry, is also pregnant and due in August. Add Earl's newborn son and Trisha's pregnancy to the mix, and they'll have had five babies in less than nine months. If Carol hadn't been without a period for two years, she'd start to wonder if her turn was coming.

"Does the whole damn town already know?" Trisha exclaims.

"Well it does now," says Sarah, shaking her head at Santiago.

"Sorry," Santiago apologize. "A drink on me to make up for spilling the beans."

"You know I don't drink anymore. Especially not when I'm pregnant!"

"A decaf hot tea!" Santiago insists.

"Oh, that I might have. Can I take my break?" she asks Linda.

"Sure." Linda closes the ledger she's been reconciling and slides off a bar stool. "Have a seat, and I'll make you that tea."

Linda walks around the bar to get a teacup and a tea bag while Trisha takes a stool next to the two married deputies. As Linda goes to get the kettle off the fireplace, which hangs beside the cauldron, Trisha calls over to her, "Where's Gunther, do you suppose? You don't think he's actually _cooking_ dinner for Dianne at the dormitory, do you?"

"Maybe," Linda replies. "Gunther's a fine cook. He was a single father for years, you know. He _had_ to cook. He just always eats here because he likes our company."

"Well, I _am_ excellent company," announces Candy, who has just entered the tavern. She sheds her jacket and hangs in on the coat rack at the entrance. Then she gives Henry a suggestive smile as she sashays by their table toward the bar.

Henry smiles back, and his eyes instinctively flit to her chest, which is accented by a tight, low-cut, pink short-sleeve t-shirt. It's chilly still for a shirt like that.

Carol shoots him a warning look.

"What?" Henry asks innocently.

Trisha hands over the order pad to Candy, saying, "I think Gunther just doesn't want us grilling Dianne again."

Candy leans suggestively against the bar beside Santiago. "What are you drinking, handsome?"

Sarah glowers at her. " _I'll_ have a beer," she answers.

"And I'll have whiskey," Santiago says. "Jack Daniel's."

"We're out." Candy walks around to the other side of the bar.

"Then whatever kind you're not out of," Santiago tells her.

"I don't mean we're out of _your_ kind, I mean we're _out_. Of all of it. Except Jamestown's white whiskey."

"You mean the moonshine?" Santiago asks.

"We've rebranded it," Linda says as she brings Trisha's teacup to the bar and Candy pours and slides Sarah her pint of beer.

"You're out of _all_ the bottled whiskey you got from the pirates _and_ Oceanside?" Santiago asks. "Already? It's been four months. And the tavern was closed for half of winter!"

"What can I say?" Candy replies. "It was a _big_ seller. We've still got gin and vodka and Schnapps. _Lots_ of Schnapps. Peppermint," she rattles them off on her fingers, "peach, apple, and watermelon. I can make you an apple vodka martini."

"I don't want a girly drink! Just bring me a beer."

"That's not a girly drink?" Sarah asks him with a smirk as she raises her own pint.

Santiago shrugs.

"Hey, the hero of the mutiny of 7 NE _himself_ was in here drinking an apple martini last night." Candy pulls Santiago a pint of beer. "So don't knock it."

"That's not possible," Carol says from their table.

"He was," Candy calls to her. "I served it to him myself."

"Daryl?" Carol's voice goes up in pitch as she asks. " _My_ Daryl?" She knows Daryl played poker in the tavern with his boys last night, for the first time since before the dead of winter, but the idea of him drinking an apple martini is beyond belief.

"Your Daryl," Candy says. "God as my witness." She holds up a hand as she slides the pint glass to Santiago.

"Yeah, I saw it, too. Girl Scout's promise." Trisha raises two fingers.

At the table in the corner, Rosita bursts out laughing. It's not so privately situated that she can't hear this entire conversation, which is fairly loud and carries well through the tavern's rafters. Her laugh makes Earl chuckle, and pretty soon, everyone in the tavern is laughing except Carol. When the laughter dies down, she asks, "Are you sure?"

"I walked up to that table," Candy swears, pointing to the table next to Carol's, against the wall, "and I said what will you all have? And they were all kind of snickering. Gunther was doing that thing he does when he's trying not laugh, where he bites down his back teeth. And Raul was chewing on his knuckle. And Mitch was kind of tittering, and Daryl glowered and ordered an appletini. So I got him one, and damn if he didn't drink the whole thing."

"Sounds like he lost a bet," Henry tells Carol.

"That's the only logical explanation," Carol agrees. The apple martini, and whatever else he may have imbibed wasn't enough to get him drunk. It did get him slightly _buzzed_ , however. He came home steady on his feet, at a reasonable hour, as he'd promised he would, but with smiling eyes and a tongue full of sweet nothings that he whispered into her ear while snuggling up to her on the couch. And when she said she appreciated his affection but was too tired to make love, he just murmured, _Can wait, can wait seven years 'n it'll be like nothin' 'cause I_ _love ya so damn much ya fierce beautiful woman_.

"Well," Carol murmurs now, "maybe he should drink apple martinis more often."

Over dinner, Carol asks Henry how Rachel is doing, and he chatters about her work as an advisor, his improvement as a fisherman and crabber, and how he's going to learn to drive the speed boat so they can take it out crabbing. As she's finishing up her venison steak, the Mason Brothers band comes in and starts setting up their equipment.

Carol, whose facing Rosita and Earl's table, can see Rosita lean forward to ask him what's going on.

Earl turns with his arm slung over the back of the chair and calls, "When do y'all start playin'?"

"We start in less than half an hour," Joanna Mason answers, the sister and singer of the brothers' band. "Y'all should stay and dance."

"That's what _we're_ here for," Santiago says.

By the time Carol and Henry's plates are being cleared, more people are filtering in for the entertainment. A few single sailors, fishermen, and farmers show up, probably in hope of dancing with Rosita. Word's probably gotten out that there's an unmarried Alliance woman in town, with no steady Jamestown boyfriend. Two single women from the Kingdom show up, also, and they immediately start getting requests to, as one sailor says, "Save a space on your dance card for me."

A group of six older teenagers, four boys and two girls, filter in. No one under seventeen is allowed in the tavern after 8 PM, so these kids must be 17, 18, or maybe even 19. Carol has trouble telling the difference between a sixteen-year-old and twenty-two-year-old these days. They all look too young to her and act too old.

Then the couples start arriving - Kelly with Seaman Harry Merriweather, Dante with Inola, and Deputy Thomas with Charlotte, his visiting Oceanside girlfriend. Gunther and Dianne walk in hand-in-hand behind them.

As Henry is counting his ammunition for the bill, Dr. Ahamad and his wife Tamara swing open the shutters. When Candy collects the tab, Enid and Raul come in, and not far after them, Garland and Shannon take a step inside.

"Where are the kids?" Carol asks them.

"Over at your place with Daryl and Sweetheart," Shannon says. "We're only going to stay and hour, and then we'll pick them right up. But Garland hasn't taken me dancing in months, and he got to go out last night with Daryl while I stayed home."

"Did Daryl really drink an appletini?" Henry asks the mayor.

Garland lets a low, deep chuckle. Shannon slaps him lightly on the shoulder. "Baby! How could you not have told me that story?"

"He didn't have any chips left to see Mitch's bet with, so Mitch bet him that if he lost the hand, he'd have to order one with a straight face and drink it like he liked it," Garland says.

"Told you!" Henry replies as he stands and tucks in his chair. Carol gets up from the table, too, and soon tables are being moved to the side to clear more space for a dance floor.

"Let's get out of here before it gets crazy," Carol tells Henry.

"I don't know," Henry says, looking at the gathering crowd. "It could be fun. It was fun last time I was here."

"But Rachel's not here this time."

"I could dance with you a couple times, Mom. And I've got _plenty_ of ammo left. We can each have another drink, and I'll still have some to take home."

"I don't know about leaving Daryl alone for an hour with _three_ children," Carol says.

"Come on. It'll be fun. I'll get you one of those Manhattans you were raving about."

Well, Carol can't say no to that. Of course, they're out of whiskey now, so she can't have a Manhattan. "How about an appletini?"

Henry grins. "You're on."


	155. Chapter 155

Daryl used to think the fastest land animal in North America was the pronghorn antelope. But now he's pretty sure it's a toddler with something in her mouth.

He vaults over the couch and runs across the cabin to stop Sweetheart. "Cough it up!" he demands as he sweeps her up by the stomach. She opens her mouth and a yellow Connect Four checker falls out and clatters onto the wood floor. She makes a cough-cough sound that would be frightening if it wasn't so damn cute. He sets her back on her feet, crouches down, and forces her mouth open to make sure that's all that's in there.

"Gary!" he scolds. "Ya can't give 'er little things."

"But she wanted to pway!"

VanDaryl smiles softly, bounces in place where he stands holding himself up by the coffee table, and then very quietly gets down on his hands and knees and starts crawling toward the bookcase, where he proceeds to remove the books one by one.

"No!" Daryl tells him and goes to slide the books back on the shelf. That's when he smells the kid's diaper. "Aw, little man! Couldn't ya of waited till yer mama came back for ya?"

[*]

Carol enjoyed her dance with her son, but now he's dancing with Dr. Ahmad's wife. The married women have taken a shine to the good manners and dancing skills Ezekiel raised him with, and Henry's indulging them. Maybe he's enjoying himself a little, too.

Earl slides onto the stool next to her, now that she's moved to the bar, where she's sipping the appletini Henry bought her. "Rosita's quite popular," he says. He has to speak a little louder than usual because of the music, but they're close enough to hear one another without yelling.

"I'm not surprised," Carol replies. Rosita's on her fifth dance now. She and Earl were just finishing up their meal when the music started and she got asked to dance by a fisherman, and it's been one man after another ever since.

Earl orders a drink from Linda. "I wonder how her boyfriend back at Alexandria would feel about all this," he muses.

"I wasn't aware she had a boyfriend back in Alexandria," Carol replies.

"No?" Earl takes the pint glass Linda has slid him. "I just assumed."

Carol got plenty of intel on Rosita's love life during that girls' night at Oceanside. Rosita fooled around with Spencer on the rebound, but he was killed by the Saviors. Then she saw Siddiq on and off, at least until he wanted to get more serious, and she got cold feet. So Siddiq moved onto a woman from Oceanside, whom he married two years ago.

Rosita went out with Father Gabriel twice, and kissed him once, but he wouldn't have sex outside of marriage, and so that was a no-go for her. She even gave Eugene a try, because he's so long harbored affections for her, and she felt sorry for him. Unfortunately, she just couldn't muster up the attraction, and eventually she had to let him down gently. Now she has a 'friend with benefits' at the Hilltop, unless she's put an end to that occasional arrangement. That's an idea Carol can't quite wrap her mind around.

"I think Rosita likes being unattached," she tells Earl.

"Well I guess there's less risk of betrayal that way." He takes a big sip of his beer.

Carol looks at him warily. "How are you holding up?"

"I'm better." He sets the mug down. "And you know…I talked about it a little bit to Rosita today. What I went through with Ana and the cheating. And talking helped."

" _Really_?"

"I don't know quite how it came up, but it did. She gets it, I think. Maybe because she's been through a similar kind of thing. She told me about that man she followed all the way from Texas."

"Abraham?"

"Yeah. She felt guilty after he died, too, for having been angry at him." He shakes his head. "At least Ana was _apologetic_ and wanted me back. Then again, at least Abraham never lied to her and just left her first. But they'd been through so much together. And what he _said_ to her…So harsh."

"What did he say to her?"

Earl looks startled by the question, as if it didn't occur to him he might be sharing personal information. He probably assumed if Rosita shared this with him, she'd shared it with Carol.

"Never mind," Carol says quickly.

Earl busies himself with his beer. He watches Rosita dance. "She seems carefree."

Carol almost laughs, but pretends to be choking on her appletini instead. _Carefree_ is not an adjective she would ever choose to describe Rosita. Hot-headed, single-minded, and feisty are adjectives more likely to come to mind. But as Carol watches Rosita dancing and smiling and having fun now, she thinks maybe Earl has a point. This Rosita is nothing like the Rosita Carol knew before and during the war with the Saviors. But maybe Rosita was lighter before the collapse of the world, before all the scars and scabs and scales roughened her exterior. Perhaps the peace of the last few years has allowed them all to gather back together the best, scattered pieces of themselves.

The music stops, and everyone on the dance floor begins to solicit new partners. Rosita ends up with the young guard Nick this time. "Well, she can be pretty intense, though" says Carol, "When she needs to be."

"Oh, I saw her marksmanship on the range today. Quite impressive."

"Have you spent all afternoon together?" Carol asks.

"I gave her a tour of Jamestown and took her to the firing range." He sips and sets his pint glass down again. "I told her she could stay in Ana's old half of the cabin tonight, since Olivia and Jeremy haven't moved in there yet. That is, if she doesn't decide to spend it in some young man's dorm room." He watches as Nick dances her between Dr. Ahmad and his wife and Dante and Inola.

Henry comes and sits beside Carol. "This band is really good!" he says over the resumed music. Garland, who has left the dance floor, leans against the bar and orders a beer. "Wait," he says, noticing Carol, "If you're _still_ here, does that mean Daryl – "

" - I'm sure he's doing fine," Carol says.

Garland shakes his head. Shannon slides an arm around his waist. "You're sharing half that pint with me, baby. I already fed both the babies for the night." She reaches for the pint Garland has just received, and there's a bit of a tug back and forth before he releases it. "Well now I'm going to drink it _all_ , greedy," Shannon tells him and slaps him on the ass before sashaying off. Garland turns forward again and orders another pint for himself.

As Garland disappears to a corner with his wife, and the next song draws to a close, Rosita comes over to them. "So are _you_ ever asking me to dance, Sheriff?"

"Well I assumed your dance card had already filled all the way up in the first five minutes."

Rosita chuckles. "It's all in pencil. I can erase anyone at any time."

Earl smiles. He drains the last of his pint, steps down from his stool, and holds out his hand. Rosita slides hers into his, and they head out onto the floor.

"This place is awesome," Henry says. "Maybe Rachel and I should open a tavern at Oceanside."

Carol laughs.

"What? It would be a good business plan, wouldn't it?"

[*]

Daryl pushes off the floor with his bare feet, and the chair rocks. VanDaryl rubs his eyes and nose sleepily against Daryl's shoulder and then looks up. His eyes are almost as green as Shannon's now, with no hint of his father's blue-gray, but his a cross between his parent's – an unusual reddish-brown. Daryl smiles at him. He can't help it. Something about babies just makes him smile, ever since that moment he first fed Judith. Maybe it's the innocence, the fact that they've never intentionally hurt anyone in this world.

VanDaryl smiles back, slowly, and when he does, his pacifier falls out of his mouth. Daryl catches and teases his lips until the baby takes it back in, because Daryl knows he's not falling asleep without it, and it's well past the baby's bedtime now. Shannon and Garland should be here soon to reclaim their boys. He wonders why Carol and Henry are taking so long just to eat dinner. They must have gotten caught up in the music and dancing.

VanDaryl rests his head against Daryl's shoulder again. He strokes the baby's soft hair with the back of his thumb and continues rocking as the tiny tyke closes his eyes and drifts off to sleep. It's past Sweetheart's bedtime too. She's lying on her side on the bear skin rug and looking at Gary, who bounces a stuffed bunny rabit toward her. She sleepily reaches for the bunny and opens and closes and opens her eyes as she bends its ears back and forth wither fingers.

"Silly wabbit!" Gary says. "Do you like him, Sweetie?"

Sweetheart makes a tired gurgling sound.

"Wabbit. Say it. Wabbit! Say wabbit, Sweetie!"

Sweetheart closes her eyes all the way.

[*]

That appletini was so good that Carol ordered a second one, though she refused to let Henry pay for this one. She's humming happily as she and Henry walk home behind Shannon and Garland, who are holding hands.

Henry, laughing, offers Carol his arm for support. "I don't think I've ever seen you drunk."

"She's not drunk!" Shannon insists. "She's just buzzed. There's a world of difference. Trust me."

Garland looks back over his shoulder and chuckles. "Feeling good, Carol?"

"Feeling mighty fine." She's giggling when she opens the door of the cabin, at least until Daryl lets out a hissing _shhhhh!_ and she falls immediately silent.

Sweetheart is tucked in and asleep in her bed, while VanDaryl slumbers in Daryl's arms and Gary is passed out on the bear skin rug with one leg slung over Dog. "Y'all late!" he whispers.

"Sorry!" Shannon whispers back. She comes over and eases the baby out of Daryl's arms while Garland scoops up Gary, who wraps his arms sleepily around his neck and his legs around his waist. Carol opens the door for them, and they creep quietly out.

She giggles when she shuts the door and says, "You were so cute with him, Pookie."

Daryl gives her a bit of a glower.

Carol walks over and pats his cheek. "Awww...Don't be a grumpy."

"Ya have fun?"

"I had a lot of fun," Carol answers.

Daryl's scowl softens. "Good. Glad ya did." He nods to Henry. "Gonna put 'er to bed. Gets a bit cool at night still. Might need to stoke the fire at some point."

"Will do," Henry assures him.

Daryl leads Carol to their bedroom and draws the drapes closed all the way around it while Henry lays out his bedroll on the couch.

Carol slings her arms around his neck. "You're _so_ adorable."

"Yer buzzed."

"Maybe a little..." she kisses his nose "...little…" she kisses his chin "... _little_ bit." Now she kisses his lips.

Daryl kisses back for awhile and pulls away, saying, "Taste sweet."

"Aplletini. They said you had one last night."

"I ain't never gonna live that down, am I?"

Carol shakes her head. "No..."

From the other side of the drapes comes a gentle snore. "Damn. He's out already?" Daryl asks. "How much he have to drink?"

"Less than me." Carol taps him on the nose.

His lips settle halfway between an amused smile and an annoyed smirk. "Ya like them appletinis?"

"It tasted like a green jolly rancher. I looooooove green jolly ranchers. I love to lick them." She sticks her tounge out, licks upward in the air, and draws it back in. "And suck on them. Oh God, I used to love to suck on them."

"Yeah?" He leans in and whispers in her ear, "I can give ya somethin' to suck on if ya want."

Carol titters. "Okay."

"Okay?" he asks skeptically, drawing back.

"Double okay." She struggles to undo his belt buckle and he takes over. When it clangs, she puts a finger to her lips. "Shhh. Quietly. _Henry_."

[*]

Carol has just the slightest hint of a headache when the sun streams into the cabin in the morning. Someone has opened all the shutters, except the one in their closed-off bedroom. Henry probably. She rolls over with a groan against Daryl's side.

He kisses the top of her head. "Ya remember what ya did last night?"

"Of course I remember. I wasn't _that_ drunk."

"Well I liked it. A lot."

"You always do."

"Mean I liked the different thing ya did," he whispers.

"What different thing?" she asks.

"Ya don't 'member?"

"I remember you tasted like a green jolly rancher."

He chuckles. "Think 'em gonna take ya out for an appletini every damn Friday night from now on." He kisses her and then eases out of bed. "Gotta hunt."

Carol sits up and rubs her eyes. "I'm getting up, too. I want to spend some time with Henry before he heads back."

They dress and when they open the drapes, Henry has Sweetheart in her high chair and is cooking something on the wood stove. "Morning, Mom. I'm making you my special hangover cure."

"I'm not hungover." She says as she walks over to the hutch and takes down their instant coffee. "I just need caffeine."

Daryl holds out his hand. "If I ain't back 'fore you leave, 's good to see ya, man."

"Yeah," Henry shakes his hand firmly, "you, too, Daryl."

"Daryl grabs his crossbow off the back of the door and kisses Sweetheart on the top of the head. Then he kisses Carol.

When his hand is on the door, Henry says, "You take good care of my mom, you hear?" which makes Carol smile.

"Well, yer mama's pretty damn good at takin' care of herself." The door creeks open, Daryl whistles, and Dog is at his heels.


	156. Chapter 156

By mid-April, Sweetheart is weaned from Shannon and has started potty training with some success. She's dry during the day half of the days, which causes Daryl to boast, "Book says 27 months 's average age for potty trainin'."

"Well the book was written when disposable diapers and washing machines were in abundant supply," Carol reminds him. "I'm pretty sure the average age of potty training in the 18th century was lower."

"Still, m'girl's advanced!"

Carol adds several more words to the baby book, including _yes_ , _ball_ , _down_ , _bun-bun_ (for the toddler's favorite stuffed bunny rabbit), _Gay_ (which is what she calls Gary), _Vee_ (her name for VanDaryl), and _Boobie_. "I don't why she calls me that!" Shannon exclaims at the boys' joint birthday party. Van Daryl turns one today, and Gary turns four in three days, so Shannon's combining the parties for her sons.

"Obviously because of her association with nursing from you," Garland tells her.

"But where did she hear that word for breasts?"

"Probably from _you_ ," Garland tells her.

"Oh, yeah," Shannon admits. "Probably. Or Daryl."

"Nah, I call 'em titties."

"Titties!" Gary cries.

"Thank you, Daryl," Garland says. "Thank you for educating my son."

"'S what uncles are for. Wait 'till I give 'em his first _Playboy_."

"You better not," Carol warns him.

"What's a pwayboy?" Gary asks.

Carol lights the candles and starts singing the birthday song to distract Gary from his question. The other adults join in. Sweetheart sits in a booster seat humming and babbling along with her own made-up words and sounds, while VanDaryl just watches and smiles quietly from his highchair.

"Just give the cake to Gary," Shannon says. "VanDaryl will spit on it trying to blow out those candles."

"Make a wish," Carol tells Gary when she sets down the cake, which took three hours extra work this week to get the supplies to bake. It's her birthday gift to the boys.

"I wish for a pwayboy!"

"Oh Good Lord," Garland mutters.

Gary blows out the candles, and Sweetheart claps. VanDaryl watches her clapping and imitates her, looking at his own hands while he does so, as if mesmerized by their ability to make sound. He turns his head, lowers his ears to them, and claps right beneath his ear, until he snags and earlobe and rears back with a grimace.

"Thank you, Awntie Cawol!" Gary cries after he's devoured his piece of cake. Sweetheart and VanDaryl got much smaller pieces, and most of the butter cream icing has ended up smeared on Sweetheart's face. VanDaryl, however, eats deliberately, pinching off tiny pieces and rolling it around in his mouth slowly before swallowing. He doesn't leave a single crumb on his dray.

Daryl looks like he's about to have an orgasm while he eats the cake, which makes Carol chuckle and whisper, "Is it as good for you as it was for me?"

"Stahp."

"Time for pwesents!" Gary announces as Shannon collects the empty plates.

Last week, Garland left the gates of Jamestown for the first time in a long time so he and Daryl could go scavenging for birthday presents and wrapping paper. It was a much-needed bonding time for the men, Carol thought. Between his work as mayor and his responsibilities as a father, Garland rarely gets time with friends. They ended being gone for two days and a night, returning at sunset on the second day.

The men took Daryl's motorcycle and a horse with a flat cart with rails. The motorcycle rode the cart until the cart was full, and then Daryl rode the motorcycle home while Garland rode horseback. They mostly hit houses and garages, and they got a lot of practice walker-slaying. They returned to Jamestown with gifts for their wives: books, kitchenware, and boots. They also found supplies for the Jamestown warehouse: nails, screws, and bolts; two mattresses sealed in plastic and miraculously not home to nesting creatures; three French presses; four kettles; a dozen items of footwear; work gloves; garden tools; paper, pencils, chalk, and notebooks; and other things the warehouse was starting to run low on.

Garland has found Gary a two-story toy garage for his matchbox cars, complete with lift, elevator, gas pumps, and ramps. Gary has no idea what the gas pumps are for, and Garland has to explain. He gives VanDaryl a set of large wood blocks and a few board books. Daryl gives the one-year-old one of those push toys with the balls that pop, even though he's only pulling up and cruising and not walking yet.

Next, as Gary tears into Daryl's gift, Carol leans back against the counter next to her husband and lightly bumps his shoulder. "That better not be a stack of _Playboys_."

"Pfft. Somethin' way better."

"Oh yeah!" Gary shouts as he discards the tattered paper on the floor and pulls out a Nerf gun with a 15-dart rotating barrel.

"Already loaded it up for ya," Daryl tells him.

Gary slides out of his chair and immediately aims at Daryl, who holds up his arms bent in front of himself, half ducks, and runs around Carol to dodge the first two shots, both of which end up hitting a pan above the wooden stove. The pan swings slightly and clangs against another pan, which falls to the ground with a clatter.

"Not in the house!" Shannon yells.

Gary chases Daryl around the couch, past the fireplace, around the kitchen table, and back to the fireplace, pulling off two more shots in the process.

"Not in the house!" Shannon yells again, so Daryl opens the front door and runs out into the settlement, with Gary fast on his heels.

[*]

The next day, the speedboat arrives at noon for its monthly postal visit. This time, the arrival is scheduled, so plenty of people are already loitering expectantly on the docks when the boat arrives. Captain McBride is glad to see Cyndie driving, but he expresses his disappointment that she didn't come in person last time.

"I _do_ have an entire village to run, you know," she reminds him.

"Do you want to tour – "

"- I want you take me out for lunch at the tavern," she interrupts him.

"Of course." He grins and holds his arm out to her.

Deputy Thomas is disappointed that Charlotte is not among the passengers, though Henry does give him a letter from her. Raul is happy to see Enid has come as promised, and they walk off hand and hand down the dock. Gunther embraces Dianne when she disembarks and tells her he has to finish up some farm chores before he can "entertain her."

"Well, I'm quite capable of entertaining myself for a couple of hours," she assures him.

"Is that so?" Gunther asks with a semi-lecherous grin.

Dianne rolls her eyes. "I was thinking of using the archery range."

Carol is surprised to see Rosita has returned once again. She's given a lot of friendly greetings from the men on the dock when she steps off the boat, but she seems to be looking around for someone in particular. "Where's Sheriff Earl?" she asks her eager entourage of men, and their faces fall.

"He's on patrol," Carol tells her. "He's probably in the village or the fort." Carol wonders if Earl was expecting Rosita to visit again this run. He's mentioned her a few times over the last four weeks, but he never suggested anything happened between them when she stayed in Ana's half of the cabin that night.

Rosita goes strutting off on her own, with a couple of hopeful men trailing after her at a distance, while the rest linger on the docks to mob Michonne when she steps off the boat. "Back off!" she tells them fiercely, and they do, with a slight look of trepidation in their eyes. "I'm not here for a booty call. Why don't you gentlemen get back to work?"

When the men have scattered back to their jobs, Carol embraces her. "I didn't expect you here!" she says as she pulls away.

"I've got to see that baby of yours," Michonne insists. "And I also thought this was the only way I was ever going to get a personal meeting with your mayor. As the chairman of my council, I should probably meet with the chairman of yours."

"Well, Daryl's certainly going to be happy to see you. How are the kids?"

Michonne fills her in as they stroll toward the museum so Carol can introduce her to Garland, but Henry has already wandered off on his own.

[*]

Michonne's grin is huge. "Judith would _love_ you," she tells Sweetheart as she sits on the bear skin rug in the Dixon cabin and helps the girl stack her favorite, soft blocks. "She'd make you her baby doll." Michonne begins to stack a second tower next to Sweetheart's. "Do you mind if I sleep on your couch tonight?"

"You're more than welcome," Carol replies. "I guess you're not looking for romance?"

Michonne snorts. "No. Although…it _has_ been awhile. Darius and I broke up almost a year ago now. It's too bad that Commander Witherspoon is gay. Because I would absolutely _hit_ that."

Carol laughs.

"And if that mayor of yours wasn't married…" Michonne stacks another block on her tower beside Sweetheart's.

"Garland _is_ handsome," Carol agrees.

"And so dignified," Michonne says. "It was a relief to meet him. I wasn't sure what to expect. But I'm glad to know you're in good hands here at Jamestown."

"Well, he won't be mayor come July. There's a two-year term limit. But he'll still be on the council for another five years, I suspect."

"So are you running for mayor next year?" Michonne asks.

" _Me?_ " Carol asks. "I haven't even served on the council for a year."

The cabin door flings open and Dog trots in. He stops and snarls at the stranger in his midst. It's been well over a year since he's seen Michonne. "Heel!" Daryl orders. "It's 'Chonne!" Dog whimpers, sits on his haunches, and licks his chops.

Daryl drops his hunting pack to the floor, hangs up his bow quickly, and goes to greet Michonne with a hug as she scrambles to her feet. He pulls away and says, "Ya meet m' baby girl?"

"I did. She's adorable."

"Smart, too. Look at them blocks. Stacked five of 'em! Book says they can only stack two at this age without 'em fallin' over."

"That's the tower _I_ built," Michonne tells him.

"Oh. Well that ain't impressive. I could of done seven."

[*]

While Daryl and Michonne hang out with Sweetheart, Carol goes looking for Henry. She finds him in the tavern toward the very end of lunch hour, just as Candy is turning the sign to closed. "Come on in," she tells Carol. "Your boy's here."

Henry is sitting at the bar and talking to Linda about how she runs her business. When Carol sits on the stool next to him, Henry says, "Get my mom one of those appletinis."

"No, no," Carol says. "They're closed until dinner. And I don't need to day drink."

"You're loss." Henry turns back to Linda. "So how do you pay the waitresses?"

"Jamestown pays us all regular rations. We're considered to be providing a service to the community. And we _are_. The tavern provide entertainment, fellowship, cooking services, _counseling_ services."

Henry chuckles.

"You'd make a good bartender," Linda tells him. "You're personable. But you have to be detail oriented if you want manage your own pub. And you have to be good at conflict resolution, especially if your waitstaff is as difficult as mine."

"Hey, I heard that!" Candy says from the other side of the bar, where she's collecting used glasses.

"Morgan – this man who taught me staff? He taught me how to peacemaker, too," Henry says. "Or at least he _tried_ too." He looks at Carol. "I wonder whatever happened to him?"

"I don't know," she says. Morgan just left on his own one day. He wanted to flee this world of violence. If only he'd stayed, he'd have known peace, and years of it. Out there on that road, he probably encountered trouble. Carol thinks he's likely dead by now, though she chooses not to think about it.

Henry returns his attention to Linda. "But you also get a cut of the take?"

"Yes, because we work way more than our twenty hours a week. Especially me. We get to keep ten percent of everything we take in – which is mostly tobacco and ammunition, some coffee beans and herbs. I give two percent each to Candy and Trisha and one percent to the apprentice." She jerks a thumb back toward a teenage boy, Gauge, who is currently wiping down tables. Carol's glad to see a little gender diversification among the staff.

"And you keep five percent?" Henry asks.

"Well, I do most of the work." Linda taps her head. "The hard part is running the numbers, organizing the schedules, fixing the menus, recruiting the musical talent. And I tend bars and wait tables when I need to, too. But the girls – and boy – get tips, too."

"But you don't have to buy the booze wholesale? Jamestown just gives it to you?"

"Well, I wouldn't call it giving. Jamestown takes ninety-percent of my cut!"

"Well, after giving you all rations," Henry reasons.

"Sustenance rations."

"So you're serious about opening at tavern at Oceanside?" Carol asks.

"Cyndie told me to write up my proposal for her and her advisors," Henry replies. "So I'm trying to figure out what to ask for, exactly. We've already got a place for it – the old mess hall. I'd just need to move things around. Decorate. Put the storage stuff behind a curtain or something. And we've got plenty of booze, but I think Cyndie will make me pay for it upfront, and then I can keep whatever I resell it for."

"Oh, I wouldn't like that," Linda says. "Where are you going to get enough of anything to pay for enough booze upfront to run a pub?"

Henry shrugs. "I thought I'd do some scavenging. And then…maybe investors?"

"Hmmm," Linda murmurs.

"You know, if my investors give me stuff to trade for booze with, I could give them a percent of my profits."

"It _could_ work," Linda muses, "but it's risky for the investors. You're going to have to be a salesman, too."

"If I draw up a plan while I'm here, would you look it over for me?" Henry asks.

"I could be persuaded, if you buy me a drink while I review it."

Henry chuckles. "Sure thing."

Carol smiles, a little proud of her son's entrepreneurial spirit. When she was raising him, she was careful to teach him to fight, to shoot a bow and arrow, and use a knife well. She dreamed for the day when those wouldn't be the most important skills for a man to have, but she'd never really envisioned that day arriving. And yet here Henry is, making plans for the future, thinking of starting a business, soliciting investors. _Investors_.

They all have a future to invest in now.


	157. Chapter 157

Michonne must get lucky enough to find someone who meets her standards, because she doesn't come back to the cabin, which means Henry gets the couch instead of the floor. "Who'd she go home with?" Carol asks her son when he returns from the tavern, where he's probably been talking shop with Linda more than dancing.

Michonne would not give any man the time of day for three full years after Rick died, and most of the Alliance's men learned not to flirt with her. But then she surprised them all by her sudden emergence into the "dating scene," such as it was. Still, Carol thinks she compares everyone to Rick in her mind, and, poor men, none of them really stand a chance. Her longest stint was with Darius, until the Alexandrian supply runner made the mistake of asking her to move in with him. Still, she's selective, so Carol wonders who in Jamestown managed to meet her standards for even a temporary tryst.

"I'm not a gossip, Mom," Henry says as he plops down on the couch.

Carol rocks in the rocking chair, cuts the thread off her sewing, and folds up Sweetheart's mended pants.

Daryl emerges from behind Sweetheart's bedroom curtain. "She's out. 's the _1999_ _Gun Digest_ finally did it."

"That would certainly put me out," Carol replies. "Henry won't tell me who Michonne went home with."

"Tell yer mama who 'Chonne went home with 'fore I slap ya upside the head."

"I'd like to see you try," Henry says jokingly, and when Daryl looks at him in narrow-eyed coolness, the young man's face goes a ghostly white, and he says, "I wouldn't. I wouldn't like to see you try. Not really. I was joking. It was a _joke_."

"'S a dumbass joke," Daryl tells him.

"I don't know. She left with some man. Thirty something. Hispanic."

"Better not have been Santiago," Daryl says.

"I'm sure it wasn't Santiago," Carol tells him. "He and Sarah seem very happily married."

"Tall," Henry says. "Like, six foot five. Looked like a basketball player."

"Definitely not Santiago," Carol says.

"Santiago and Sarah weren't there," Henry says. Her son is getting to know the people of Jamestown by name, she sees, in just three trips.

"Carlos," Daryl tells her as he gets down on his haunches and pets the dog. "The lieutenant."

"Hmmm," Carol muses.

"What does _hmmm_ mean?" Harry asks.

"I just…I don't really know Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado." He wasn't on the trade voyage to Oceanside, but he was promoted to lieutenant when they returned in the wake of the captain's death.

Daryl feeds the fire. They aren't going to want the fire at night in another three weeks. They don't much need it now, but it's good for light at night. "Know his name."

"I know _everyone's_ name. And I do know him by sight. He's good-looking."

Daryl glances back at her with a furrowed brow.

"Not as handsome as you, Pookie. Unless you like that tall, well-kept, smooth-cheeked look."

"I don't."

"No?" Carol asks. "Want me to grow a beard?"

"Stahp." Daryl stands, throws himself down in the armchair, and puts a foot up on the coffee table.

"What do you think of him?" Carol asks her husband. "You went on that expedition with him."

Daryl and Mitch found signs of a small, migrating herd when they were out hunting one day, and Jamestown wanted to make sure it had moved on far enough from its gates. The council sent Daryl, Deputy Santiago, and Mitch to track, and they sent Captain McBride, Commander Witherspoon, and Lieutenant Alvarado for extra fire power if necessary. They were gone three days and two nights and found that the herd had, fortunately, moved well on.

"Carlos 's a'right. Competent."

"Well, that's what every girl wants," Carol muses. " _Competent_."

"Stahp."

Carol chuckles and Henry looks embarrassed to have to witness the exchange.

Daryl turns in early because he has to hunt early, but Carol stays up another two hours talking with Henry, who's excited about the possibility of running a pub at Oceanside. "What does Rachel think of all this?" Carol asks.

"She's supportive. That's what Dad said, you know, that it's important for a married couple to be a team."

"Mhmh." Ezekiel did believe firmly in being a team, except for him, being a _team_ meant Carol was supposed to play queen to his king. He was devoted and adoring and complimentary, a lovely contrast to Ed in that sense, but he wasn't inclined to want her to be herself, unless being herself meant being his idealized image of her.

It's different with Daryl. She can be _real_. She always could be genuinely vulnerable with Daryl, and he was never intimidated by her strength. She can show him both the tarnished and the shiny sides of her coin, whereas with Ezekiel, it felt she always had to polish the tarnished side and dim the shiny one. As much as she cared for Ezekiel – and she did care for him - there was something stifling about the air up on that pedestal he put her on. He never liked it when she came down off it, and she came down off it more often than he liked. At some point, if he hadn't died, she probably would have kicked the whole damn pedestal to shit, and their marriage would have fallen apart. "Just be aware Rachel may have her own ambitions, and don't try to make her only a prop to yours."

Henry scoffs. "She wouldn't let me."

"Good."

"And she _does_ have ambitions. She wants to be chieftain one day."

"Oh." That ambition's a little more grandiose than Carol would have expected. "Cyndie's still young." The woman's not even thirty. "I don't guess she'll be stepping down anytime soon."

"None of the other communities have a chieftain. Everyone has elected councils."

"Not the Hilltop." The governance of the Hilltop fell like a load of bricks on Jesus and Tara. When Aaron moved there to be with Jesus, he helped shoulder the burden. The inhabitants of the community accept the "gay triumvirate" as they're sometimes jokingly called, because none of them want the responsibility of filling those shoes. But at some point, new leaders will have to rise up. No one can carry that weight for life, and all lives have an end. "The Kingdom didn't either." Carol was the sole monarch of the Kingdom for a year. She carried on the traditions that seemed to work when Ezekiel was alive, but she made subtle changes here and there, at a pace the people could accept. Like Ezekiel, she appointed her own advisors – Jerry, William, Dianne, and, after they married, Daryl.

"But democracy is always better, isn't it?"

"Different governments work for different people in different places at different times," Carol suggests. "Don't you think what your father did worked for the Kingdom?"

"Yeah."

"But you don't think what Cyndie is doing is working for Oceanside?"

"It's working," Henry says. "I just think it could work _better_. So does Rachel. Obviously."

"And anyone else?"

Henry shrugs.

"Rachel better find out if she has support before she starts advocating for a major change. People are afraid of change, especially when they've had a taste of security in an insecure world."

"Jamestown changed. It wrote up a new charter and went from an appointed government to an elected one."

"Yes. But Garland led them carefully through that transition, and Garland had the power to do it, because leadership had already fallen to him through the old charter. Just be careful. That's all I'm saying. I'm not saying a change isn't in order. I'm just saying being careful in how you push for it. Rachel doesn't want to make enemies in her own camp."

Henry seems to consider her advice. Carol wonders if he'll pass any of it on. If he does, he'd do better not to mention where it came from. They talk a little more before turning into bed, and in the morning she's reluctant to say goodbye to her son and her other old friends, but by noon, they're all heading up the river.

[*]

Sheriff Earl is whistling as he wipes down the bench in one of the two cells. "Good night last night?" Carol asks with a teasing smirk as she walks into the jailhouse.

Earl stands, folds up the rag, and walks through the open door of the cell. He tosses the rag in the hamper they keep there for prison bedding and linens and occasionally the clothes of inmates. "Well, except for the drunk and disorderly I had to haul in. He vomited all over the jail cell. I just realized I missed a spot last night."

"Where is he now?"

"Santiago relieved me at midnight. He must have sent him home before he got off his shift. His court hearing is in the afternoon. He'll have to pay a fine, I'm sure. He didn't hurt anyone, but he said some foul things to Rosita."

"Ah. I'm surprised Rosita didn't take care of that herself."

"She did. I had to haul her in, too."

"Are you serious?" Carol takes the notebook from off the top of the filing cabinet and slides a pencil in her front shirt pocket.

"She punched him right in the nose and broke it in two places."

"You put Rosita in the other cell?"

"No. I put her under house arrest in my cabin."

Carol raises and eyebrow.

"I'm kidding. That asshole realized he deserved it, and he agreed he wasn't going to press charges against her after I spoke to him."

" _Spoke_ to him," Carol echoes doubtfully.

"A calm conversation. And I certainly wasn't going to charge her." The Sheriff's Department can press charges on behalf of Jamestown even if a victim refuses to. "But you know, the council might want to talk about this now that we're having guests regularly. I mean…do we treat them like we do probationary residents? If they _were_ to have charges pressed against them, what then? Do we hold them against their will until their trial is over? Or do we just send them home and say don't come back? We don't have procedures to deal with _visitors_."

"I'll bring it up at tomorrow's council meeting."

Earl nods.

Carol smiles. "So, how _did_ your night go after you put Rosita under house arrest?"

Earl grins at the ground, and then he looks up. "Think you can get me on that trade trip in May? Rosita said she'd come to Oceanside if I did."

"You want to leave Benjamin that long?" Carol asks.

"He'll have Olivia. And Jeremy. And a whole town of people checking in on him. He's a very popular little guy."

"He _is_ adorable," Carol agrees. "But it's not easy. I missed Sweetheart last time we went." And they're probably going to leave her again. She's not yet _fully_ potty trained, which would be an inconvenience aboard a ship. Carol feels less reluctant about it now that she's done it once and Sweetheart still remembered her. She also feels less reluctant about it now that Henry, Rachel, Michonne, Enid, Rosita, and Dianne have all me the little girl, though she'd still like to show her off to Jerry and Nabila, and Daryl wants his friends Tara and Aaron to meet her. They've decided they'll take her to the trade fair in November, when more people will be present at Oceanside, and all their friends can meet her. Sweetheart will be almost two and maybe even able to play some of the games.

Earl points to the notebook in her hands. "You might want to check over Santiago's notes. He had some concerns about Edgar again."

"Oh no." Edgar's the Peeping Tom who was caught masturbating as he secretly watched the women bathe from behind the tree line.

"He found him near the _Discovery_ at half past midnight."

"And what was he doing?"

"Taking a walk," Earl says. "He _claimed_. Santiago didn't see him _do_ anything. So he gave him a ticket for being out past curfew without a reason and sent him on his way." In Jamestown, except on special occasions, the tavern closes at ten, the torch lights on the paths go out at ten thirty, and anyone out after eleven without a good reason can potentially be fined. It's meant to keep noise levels low and ensure extra security, and its also a tool the deputies can use to warn potential ne'er-do-wells that they have their eyes on them.

"But what does Santiago _suspect_ he was doing?" Carol asks.

"Peeping."

"At the _Discovery_?" she asks in confusion. No women live on the Discovery. There are two cabins on board where a couple of the naval officers live, using the galley as their kitchen and the deck as their living room.

"Apparently Lieutenant Alvarado had a guest last night."

"Oh." Michonne would have been that guest, Carol supposes. "And he didn't pull the curtain over the cabin window?"

"Not all the way. Santiago wrapped on the window to give him a heads-up once he sent Edgar on his way."

Carol shakes her head. "That guy activates my Spidey sense." That's what she used to tell Sophia, when they walked by the creepy neighbor who was always overfriendly and wanting to give Sophia candy.

"Mine, too. Let's keep a close eye on him."

"He lives in the suite B of the dorms?" Carol asks. "Any women in that suite?"

"No, all the women are in suite C except the one in suite A. That's Gunther and Raul's suite, and she's in her sixties, so I'm not worried about her. But I'd watch to make sure Edgar's not lingering outside the suite C windows."

Carol nods. "If we do get him on something, it'll be a second strike, and we can hold him longer and fine him more. Maybe it'll make an impression."

"What will make an impression with that second conviction is knowing he's then one strike from banishment."

Carol swings by the dormitory on her rounds, but sees no sign of Edgar. It's afternoon, after all, and everyone is busy with work. She finds him skinning fish later when the _Susan Constant_ has returned with its nets full. He's not a bad looking man, except for the disfiguring scar trailing down from his left eye to his chin, which makes his behavior all the more puzzling to her. She always imagines creepy pervs as physically unattractive men, even if she knows, intellectually, that there doesn't have to be a connection there. He's quiet, keeps to himself, and doesn't talk to the other chattering people who are cleaning fish, though he does glance sometimes surreptitiously at one of the women. Her husband doesn't seem to notice. He's more concerned with the man who has been openly flirting with her with no real ill intent.

Carol stands before them long enough until Edgar notices her. She wants him to know the Sherriff's Department has an eye on them. "Hello, deputy," one of the cleaners, says. "How are you today?"

"Doing well, Mark, thank you. And you?"

"Oh, I'll be doing better when I'm not inhale fish stank."

Carol smiles and patrols on. She passes Gunther leaning against one of the fence posts and taking a water break when she's on the path toward the settlement. "Mornin', Carol," he draws.

"Good _afternoon_ ," she replies.

"What time is it?"

"Sometime after one." She started her rounds at one.

He wipes an arm across his sweaty brow. "I lost track of time. I've been catching up on the work I missed when Dianne was here."

"Is that going well?"

"I like to think so. I'm not getting my hopes up."

"Yes, you are," Carol assures him. "And that's okay. The worse that happens is they get dashed."

Gunther chuckles. "Thank you." He looks over her shoulder. "Where are you going in that get-up?"

Carol turns and sees Candy walking down the path, wearing a revealing spring dress and a pair of sandals – perfectly acceptable spring attire in the old world, but impractical in this one.

"None of your beeswax, Gunther!" she shouts back. "You're not my father!" She stops and gives him a pointed look. " _Or_ my grandfather."

"Ouch," he tells her. "I'm not old enough to be your grandfather." He seems to be doing the math in his mind. Candy is in her late twenties, and he's in his early fifties. "In the normal order of things, anyway."

"You have a good time with Dianne?" she asks him.

"I did."

"I noticed you didn't bring her dancing last night."

"We were preoccupied with other things this time around."

"Uh-huh," Candy says with a teasing smile. "See you at the tavern for dinner tonight." She waves to him with three fingers and struts on.

"She worries me," Gunther admits to Carol. "She's like a little sister. Like a little sister who's going to drag me into a fight I don't want to be in."

"You're good to look out for her," Carol tells him. She waves to him before patrolling on.

When she gets off her shift, Daryl is back from hunting. He's sitting on the couch and reading a book with a sleepy Sweetheart leaned against his side, a sippy cup of water in her hand, opening and closing her eyes. She opens them wide when Carol comes in, smiles big, and then closes them again. This time they don't open. Daryl carries her to bed and draws the drapes. He sneaks up on Carol, who is facing the fireplace to lay her deputy's star on the mantle. He surrounds her with his arms, pulls her back against him, and murmurs, "She'll be out for an hour."

"Thirty minutes. You know she only power naps now."

"Mhmhm." He kisses a vulnerable spot on her neck, one he knows drives her just a little bit crazy. "Just enough time."

"I don't know."

"Been awhile."

Carol chuckles, squirms lose, takes his hand, and guides him to their own bedroom, where she pulls the drapes all the way closed.


	158. Chapter 158

It's time to plan for the May trade trip that's coming up in a week. Now that the speedboat has visited three times, the council has actual lists of desired goods from each of the communities, so they know what inventory to bring. But they still have to select the crew and passengers.

"Captain McBride, of course," Commander Witherspoon says, and Thomas scrawls the name on a pad. "I'm not going this time. I don't have a girlfriend at Oceanside, and I'm not looking for one."

"We need someone besides McBride who can pilot the ship, then," Carol says.

"Either the lieutenant-commander can," Witherspoon replies, "or the lieutenant."

"Well, the lieutenant commander hasn't applied to go." Garland pulls an application out of a folder. "But Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado notes romantic reasons for wanting to."

Carol smiles slightly. She's not sure Michonne feels the same way. She's not even sure Michonne will be traveling to Oceanside in May. Then again, a no-strings-attached tryst that only happens a few times a year might be exactly what she's looking for.

Thomas scrawls the lieutenant's name on the pad.

"We need a third officer," Witherspoon says, "so add Junior Lieutenant Donny O'Dell. "

The council selects seven more navy men for the sailing crew and then moves onto the passengers. "Put Carolyn down," Garland says. We'll need her to check any animals, as before. Thomas, put yourself down."

"I withdraw my application."

"Why? We need a medic onboard, and you sight romantic interests."

"Yeah…uh…that romantic interest kind of fizzled, I guess." Thomas flushes lightly. "That letter Charlotte sent last week? She said she found someone else at Oceanside, a Kingdom immigrant, and she doesn't want to see me again."

"Oh." Garland looks apologetic to have forced him into that publica admission.

"I'd rather not go and have to see her with him, if you don't mind."

"Very well. But we do need medical personnel on that ship." Garland pages through the applications. "Dr. Emily, then. She applied. She wants to see old Kingdom friends. Any objections?" Garland scans the other councilmembers and no one speaks, so Thomas writes her name down.

"I'll be on the ship, won't I?" Gunther asks.

"It was like pulling teeth to get you to go last time." Inola smiles teasingly. "I wonder what's changed?"

"Put Gunther down," Garland says. "If there are no objections?"

There are none.

"Carol and Daryl of course," Garland says. He holds up three applications. "Raul applied three times, as if he thinks we might be drawing lots."

"Pathetic," Barry mutters.

"It's adorable!" Inola insists. "He's in love. Is Enid coming to represent the Hilltop?"

Two or three members of each community will come to trade, but it won't be like the trade fair. "No," Carol says. "She might have to deal with a C-section in May or June, so she's staying put. But Daryl's going to take Raul to the Hilltop on his motorcycle. So we'll need room for that onboard the ship."

"That shouldn't be a problem," Witherspoon says.

"Go ahead and put Raul down, if there are no objections." Garland shuffles through the papers as Thomas writes Raul's name down. "Candy's applied again."

"Good Lord," Gunther mutters. "No."

Garland holds the paper over the reject pile, but, Thomas, who sits next to him, says, "Let me see that." He reads it over and then looks across the table at Gunther. "Did it occur to you she might be looking for love?"

"No," Gunther replies. "If she was, I think she could have easily found it by now. Plenty of men would marry her."

"For the sex," Thomas says. "You're equating marriage with love. It's not necessarily the same thing."

"Oh, trust me, I know that all too well," Gunther tells him.

"Then you can appreciate that maybe Candy wants to find someone who doesn't know her past," Thomas suggests. "Who doesn't prejudge her. And who might respect her for her other virtues."

"What other virtues?" Barry asks.

Gunther glowers at him. "Candy's actually much smarter than she lets on. But I know her. She's cynical. I doubt very much she's looking for a real relationship. She's looking for new clients."

"Well," Thomas says. "She claims otherwise." He turns the application toward Gunther.

Carol leans forward to read what's written beneath "Why do you wish to be a part of the trade team?": _I'm looking for love._

In the "What skills do you have to offer?" section, she's written: _I can haggle like nobody's business. I know the going rates for everything in Jamestown, which will make me indispensable as a trader. And if there are any men we have to haggle with, trust me, I'm getting the best deal possible._

Carol smiles. "She may actually have talent as a trader."

"I'm sure she does," Gunther replies. "I'm more concerned about what she'll be trading and her safety while attempting to trade it."

"I'm concerned about the venereal diseases she may bring back," Dr. Ahmad says. "As before."

"I think that ship has sailed," Carolyn says. "Our men are already intermixing with Oceanside's women. Let's hope everyone's clean, or that our penicillin is in good supply, because we can't prevent that anymore."

"Nature compels," Barry agrees.

"So you're actually in favor of sending Candy?" Garland asks Carolyn.

"No. Absolutely not."

"Let's vote on this. All in favor of allowing Candy onto the ship?" Garland asks.

Thomas's hand goes up. Carol's not sure it's the best call she's ever made, but she raises her hand. Why not give Candy a chance? They've all grown and changed over the years. What if she really is looking for someone who can see her apart from her history? Garland raises his hand. The man is a romantic at heart, Carol suspects. Gunther shakes his head, Carolyn rolls her eyes, and Dr. Ahmad says, simply, "No." Barry sits with his arms crossed over his chest and Inola shrugs apologetically but does not raise her hand.

"I guess that's a no." Candy's application flutters down onto the reject pile. Garland pulls out another. "Earl's applied again. He sights romantic reasons. Rosita, I suppose."

"It might be good to have some non-naval law on that ship," Carol suggests. "And he can shoot well if a need arises. All in favor?" That's usually Garland's line, but she told Earl she'd try to get him on that ship. She's relieved to see every hand go up so she doesn't have to fight him.

The rest of the spots involve more haggling. "Can we sort out which of these men who are re-applying developed romantic attachments?" Garland asks. "Because I think it would be reasonable to nurture those attachments."

"Why exactly?" Barry asks.

"Because we're trying to repopulate the earth," Carolyn replies.

Barry laughs. "Why don't you do your part, then, sweetheart?"

"I _am_. By encouraging these matches."

"Matches just mean more mouths to feed," Barry says.

"It will lead to greater social stability," Garland suggests, "if more of these men have more feminine influence in their lives."

"I have started cleaning up more," Gunther admits.

"I noticed." Carolyn looks him over. "You're not bad-looking when you aren't covered in animal hair and dirt and you don't smell like cow dung."

"I meant my apartment, but thank you, I suppose."

They work through the applications until they come up with a full ship.

[*]

"Damnit!" Candy curses when Gunther tells her she didn't make the roster.

"I was pulling for you," Thomas tells her. He sits between Gunther and Commander Witherspoon.

"Well thank you, deputy. I appreciate that," Candy tells him. "At least _someone_ has my best interests in mind." She glares at Gunther.

"I very much have your best interests in mind," he replies.

Carol, who sits around the L of the bar, takes a quiet sip of her beer. She's begun enjoying these weekly trips to the tavern after Thursday's long morning council meeting – they're the after-work happy hours she never got to go to because Ed insisted she quit her job, and, like a dutiful wife, she did. But now she has the job and the friends. The company changes each week, but there are usually between three and four fellow council members available to go get a drink. The lunch hour is coming to a close, and the place will shut down soon for the pre-dinner break, so this group at the bar are the only ones in the tavern.

"Get Thomas a shot of white whiskey on me," Gunther says. "As medicine for his recent heartache."

"Awww," Candy says as she pours him some moonshine. "Is that why that girl didn't come on the speedboat in April? Did she dump you, sugar?"

"She found someone better."

Candy laughs dismissively and sets the glass in front of him. "Better than a deputy lawman, whose also a medic, and who has the cutest freckles a girl ever saw?"

Thomas laughs. "You're really working for your tips, aren't you?"

"Well, I know you aren't buying that drink, so you can afford to tip well." Candy smacks Gunther on the front of his shoulder over the bar. "You kept me off that ship, didn't you?"

"Looking for love?" Gunther replies. " _Really_? After how much you mocked Trisha for marrying Andrew? Color me skeptical."

"A girl can dream." Candy looks over Gunther's shoulder as the tavern doors swing open and Mitch and Daryl stroll in. Mitch takes the stool next to the commander, while Daryl makes his way around the L of the bar to Carol. When he sits down on the stool next to her, he smells strongly of lye soap, as if he's just washed up from the hunt. "Hey, Beautiful," he murmurs. "'S a girl like you doin' in a dump like this?"

Carol laughs.

"Don't let Linda hear you call this place a dump," Candy warns him.

"Any stew left?" Daryl asks. "'M starvin'."

"I can scrape the cauldron. Mitch?"

"Please," Mitch replies. "And a pint of beer."

"On my tab," Commander Witherspoon insists. "I mean, Mitch's food and drink. Not Daryl's."

"I think it's my turn to pay," Mitch says.

Commander Witherspoon shakes his head, and Mitch doesn't argue.

"Just water for me," Daryl says. "Damn thirsty."

When Candy returns with their bowls of stew, Thomas asks, "Catch anything good?"

"An elk," Mitch replies. "We took one of the two adult bulls now that they've bred. We counted five calves in that herd."

"Are they weaned?" Gunther asks.

"They are," Mitch replies, "but the cows won't be sexually mature for about a year, the bulls two. Then they'll breed and we can cull the older adults."

"Sounds incestuous," Candy says as she puts a glass of water in front of Daryl.

"Ain't a taboo in nature," Daryl tells her.

"Or the trailer park," Thomas jokes.

Daryl's spoon freezes halfway to his mouth and he looks pointedly at Thomas, who scoots backward on his stool apologizing. "I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry, I was just joking. I'm sorry. I really didn't mean any offense. I –"

"- I ain't never lived in a trailer park," Daryl interrupts him. "Grew up in a cabin in the mountains. After that, lived in m'brother's truck for a bit. Then 'n apartment. Then the truck again. Then his girlfriend's house. Then the truck. Then some other one of his girlfriend's houses. Then the truck. Then - "

"- I get the picture," Thomas interrupts.

" _I_ grew up in a trailer park," Candy says. "I'm sure you're all shocked."

"I didn't mean to insult you either," Thomas assures her.

"I know you were just joking, sugar. And I may not have had the classiest upbringing, but I was the _first_ in my family to go to college. Well, until the Great Sickness hit."

"You were getting your bachelor's of science in Computer Information Systems," Thomas says. "And you were six credits shy of graduating when the shit hit the fan."

"You remember me saying that?"

Thomas nods.

"Hmm. I didn't think anyone ever listened to me. Well, a fat lot of good that education does me in this world!"

"You could help Linda create a more efficient paper information system," Gunther suggests.

"I'm not a _file clerk_ ," Candy insists.

"Linda's going to be dead one day, and you and Trisha are going to have to run this place."

Candy shakes her head. "Now way. She's going to outlive us both."

"How much meat is in that bull?" Thomas asks.

"200 to 250 pounds," Daryl answers between bites.

Gunther whistles. "Not bad for wild game. I mean, it's almost twice that for a cow, but still."

"Cow huntin' ain't 'zactly a skill," Daryl says.

"No, but raising and herding them is."

"Speakin' of which, Dog's gettin' warn out, 'tween the huntin' 'n the herdin'. Want to take him off a day of herdin'. No Sundays."

"He learned quickly," Gunther says. "He's my second best herd dog now. And I've only got three. Maybe you could take him off a day of hunting instead?" When Daryl leans forward slightly to glare at Gunther, the farmer replies, "I'll take that for a no."

[*]

Carol has evening patrol tonight. The Indian Village is filled with the scent of outdoor grilling. Kids play on the dirt streets between huts. In the fort, it's much the same. She passes Sheriff Earl's cabin, where he's sitting out front in a wicker chair and rocking with baby Benjamin in his arms. "Evening, Sheriff," she says.

"Evening, deputy."

"How are the babies?" Olivia was safely delivered of a healthy baby girl the day after the speedboat left. She and Jeremy and the infant have moved into Ana's old half of the cabin. Earl lives in the other half with Benjamin but brings him through the door in the dividing wall to nurse, and he leaves him with Olivia when he works.

"Benji and Hope are both in good health," Earl answers. " _Thriving_ the doctor says. Although Hope cries a lot."

Carol pauses to peer at the two-month-old Benjamin. A lock of blonde hair curls over his sleepy blue eyes.

"He doesn't really have my chin," Earl admits. "I know that." Earl smiles and the baby and continues, "But he's mine. And that's all he's ever going to know."

Carol nods. "You'll make a good father, Earl." She patrols on. She stops to give Daryl a kiss on the cheek where he's flipping elk steaks on the grill as he keeps an eye on Sweetheart, whose ankle he's tethered by a rope to a metal stake he's dug into the dirt in back of the cabin, like a little criminal. "That smells so good," Carol says.

"Make ya a plate," Daryl says. "Stop by on yer next loop."

"On duty?"

"Gotta eat."

"True." Sweetheart toddles up to her, and Carol gives her a hug. "That's worse than those leashes people used to use in the mall, Pookie."

"Works. She ain't wandered off any further than that rope'll go."

"Well watch out she doesn't wind herself up in it."

"She has. Don't hurt 'er none."

As if to demonstrate, Sweetheart takes off toddling in a circle around the stake, until the rope has wrapped around it several times, she gets dizzy, and she falls laughing on her bottom.

"She'll unwind," Daryl tells her.

Carol shakes her head and patrols on. She passes into the trapezoidal addition to the settlement, walks past the pig pen and the chicken coop, around the rabbit hutch and beyond the greenhouse, loops back past the brewery, inhaling the sticky sweet scent of beer, and onto the storehouse. There she notices the padlock has been loosened from the latch of the door. She enters cautiously inside, hand on the butt of her gun, to find Raul kneeling on the ground and rifling through one of the cardboard boxes of jewelry. "Hey," she says.

"Hey. Garland let me in. I'll lock the padlock on my way out. I was just looking for a ring for Enid. Thanks for getting me on the ship."

"A ring?" Carol asks.

"Not _that_ kind of ring. I don't want to scare her off. Just a…you know. Going steady ring?" Raul stops rummaging and turns toward Carol. "Think she'll say yes to that? Or is that too much? I mean, I know we've only spent a total of like six days together. But it's been months."

"I doubt she's interested in seeing anyone else anyway," Carol tells him. "I'm sure she'll appreciate the ring. You have a good evening."

"You too, ma'am." He begins sifting through the rings again.

Carol makes a loop through the settlement and village and back to her cabin, where she eats quickly with Daryl and Sweetheart before resuming her rounds.

[*]

At 10:30 PM, Carol starts snuffing out the torches that light the path to the settlement and then the ones still flickering throughout the fort. Most of the cabins are dark, but fires, oil lamps, and candles glow in the windows of a few. Guided by the light of a lantern, and the sparkling stars in the clear sky above, Carol makes her way down to the docks. She plans to patrol past the museum and check on the dormitory one last time before her shift ends, just to make sure that peeping tom Edgar isn't lingering beneath the suite C windows.

Fireflies drift over the wooden planks of the docks, weave between the ships, and flash their calls of love on and off. When Carol's walking by the garden of herbs outside the museum, where the nation's flags flap softly in the spring breeze, she hears the sounds of a scuffle outside the dormitory. Masculine shouts fracture the silence. The sound of blows, screams of pain, cries of "Help!" and shouts of "Stop!" fill the air.

Unsnapping the sheath to her knife, Carol begins to run. She flies past the edge of the museum, rounds the corner, and comes to a panting, shocked stop.

"Gunther!" Raul is shouting. "Stop! You'll _kill_ him!"

There, in the old museum parking lot, before the dormitory, in the light of the full moon, kneels the usually mild farmer. His feet are bare, and he's wearing only a pair of dark boxers and a white, short-sleeve T-shirt, as if he's been dragged from bed. One of his knees is bent against the pavement, and the other pins down a man by his stomach.

Gunther tightly grips a wad of the man's hair in each of his hands as he pounds his head over and over into the pavement. Blood spreads like an oil stain across the crumbling asphalt.


	159. Chapter 159

Carol immediately tries to stop Gunther, but he's too big for her. She may be a crack shot with a gun and a bow, and a master of the knife, but when it comes to hand-to-hand affairs, she's no match for a stocky man. He pushes her off easily, and she shouts to Raul for help. Together, they wrestle Gunther off the man and pin his arms behind him.

Gunther gasps for breath while Carol fishes out her handcuffs and clicks them in place over his wrists, just to keep him from resuming his attack until she can figure out what's going on. "Go get Thomas to treat this man," she tells Raul.

Raul begins to head toward the dormitory when Gunther says, "Don't! Thomas is with Candy."

"I don't care who he's with!" Carol exclaims. "He's the closest medical professional, and this man is – "

"I mean he's _treating_ Candy," Gunther interrupts.

"Get Dr. Emily," Carol orders Raul, and he runs toward the museum. "What happened to Candy?"

More curious onlookers begin to spill out of the dormitory in response to all the noise, until there are about ten men and three women lingering in the parking lot. Dwight and Sherry are among them, and they stand whispering to one another.

Gunther takes a step back and looks at the man on the pavement, as if he can't quite believe what he's done. "Did I kill him?"

Carol recovers the oil lamp she put down to wrestle Gunther away from his victim and sets it down beside the man. When she crouches down, she sees its Edgar, the peeping tom. Blood pools behind his head and runs from his nose, and one eye is bruised and crusted shut. He's alive, if possibly unconscious.

Carol stands. She looks Gunther over and doesn't see any wounds on him – nothing but a slight bruise developing on his left cheek. "What the hell happened?"

Gunther turns his wrists in the cuffs behind himself. He swallows nervously. "Is he dead?"

"He's breathing. For now anyway. What happened?" She puts a hand on Gunther's shoulder and pushes him away from Edgar and out of earshot of the crowd. "Tell me."

"I think I better not say anything until I see the defense attorney."

"Gunther, it's just me. Carol. You're friend. I'm not trying to trip you up here. I'm trying to help."

"If he dies, it's manslaughter at best. I could be - "

"- Gunther! Talk to me! What happened?"

Gunther grits his teeth. His nostrils flare as he looks over her toward the bloody man. Footsteps pound on the sidewalk outside of the museum. Dr. Emily round the corner with Raul, a medical bag in her hand, as he lights her way with a flashlight lantern.

Carol waves the doctor over. Emily crouches down by the wounded man and flings open her bag. "Go find Earl," Carol tells Raul. "He should be at the jailhouse, waiting to relieve me."

Raul nods and jogs to the bike rack outside of the dorm, where he grabs a dirt bike and begins heading quickly toward the settlement, half standing up as he pumps the pedals.

The crowd from the dorm is murmuring louder. Carol can hear bits and pieces of their questions. Dwight slides a protective arm around Sherry.

Carol walks Gunther still further away from the prying eyes and asks, once again, "What happened? Did he attack Candy? Is that why she's being treated?"

Gunther grits his teeth and looks up at the moon and blinks.

"Gunther," Carol says softly. "Hey, I want to help you. I want to help Candy. But you need to tell me what happened."

Gunther nods. "Candy went to his room. For…you know. To _trade_. But she only goes so far. She's clear about that up front. He took more than she was offering. He took it violently. She came to my room after. She was weeping. She was beat-up. And…I lost it. I just…" He shakes his head. "I just _lost_ it."

"Okay." Carol puts a hand on the chain that binds his wrists. "Let's go see Candy."

[*]

Carol knocks on the door to Gunther's bedroom. "Thomas? Candy? It's Carol. I need to talk to you."

"Go away!" Candy howls from inside.

His wrists still behind himself, Gunther leans his forehead against the door. "Candy," he murmurs through the wood, his voice choked with a mixture of sadness and anger. He takes a moment to steady it. "I'm here too. It's all right. Carol just wants to help."

There's a murmur of voices from inside the room, Thomas's and then Candy's, and then Thomas says, "Come in."

Gunther steps back, and Carol cautiously opens the door. Thomas's medical bag is open and on the desk. He's barefoot and wearing gray sweatpants and a frayed black-and-white T-shirt featuring the art from Pink Floyd's _Darkside of the Moon_ album cover. Candy is wrapped in a blanket and sitting on Gunther's bed next to the medic. One of her arms is outside the blanket, because the wrist and forearm have just been splinted. She has a light red bruise over her left eye that will purple and then blacken with time, a color evolution Carol knows all too well.

Gunther leans a shoulder against the door frame, but when curious onlookers filter inside the suite, he steps inside. Carol closes the door. She pulls out a chair from Gunther's desk, which is littered with ledgers, pencils, notebooks, and legal pads pertaining to farm management. A shelf above the desk contains a row of books between two bookends shaped liked little bronze baby shoes – books on planting, gardening, animal husbandry, and then a few novels: Tom Clancy, John Grisham, Robert Ludlum. Taped-up notes plaster the wall above the desk – reminders for this and that chore. A notecard reads "Dianne" on the top line, and beneath that, little tidbits – "favorite color – blue"; "favorite wine - Chardonnay"; "favorite author – Agatha Christie" and so forth. It's endearing, and Carol would tease him about it if it were any other moment in time. "Candy," she asks gently, "can you talk to me about what happened?"

Candy shakes her head. "I don't want to." She looks down at the rug-like mat Gunther's used to cover a large portion of the earthen floor of his small room.

"You don't have to right now," Carol assures her. "We can talk about it later. But I wanted to see if you're-" she almost says okay. But she knows Candy is anything but okay. "- If you've been treated."

"Thomas took care of me." She looks up slightly, until her eyes are level with the cuffs on Gunther's wrists. "Is Gunther in trouble?"

"No," Carol assures her, even though that's not entirely true. "We'll get it all sorted out." She stands and takes out her handcuff key and motions for Gunther to turn around. When he does, she clicks the cuffs loose, slides them free, and hooks them back onto her belt. Gunther rubs his wrists.

"What did you do?" Candy asks him.

"It doesn't matter," he says. "I'm here now."

Thomas stands from the bed and Gunther takes his place beside Candy. He slides an arm comfortingly around her, and she lays her head on his shoulder. He grits down on his back teeth and closes his eyes.

Deputy Thomas jerks his head toward the door, and Carol follows him out, clicking it shut softly behind her. When they're in the suite's common room, which is empty at the moment, she says, "Edgar raped her."

"I know."

"Did Candy give you any more information than that?"

"He clearly slapped her around in the process," Thomas replies. "Broke her wrist. She was in his room because he hired her for…" Thomas lowers his voice. "For a private strip tease and a handjob. But she wasn't selling more than that. I examined her. I can testify it was forced. I mean…" A line jumps in the deputy's jaw. "It's obvious enough to me anyway. But he'll probably try to claim it was consensual, that he paid for rough sex and that breaking her wrist was an accident."

"Did anyone hear anything?"

"I don't know. It happened in his room in suite B. I live in this suite, next door to Gunther. Gunther woke me up after she came running to him. He asked me to treat her, and then he disappeared. I don't know where he went, but I heard the shouting out front."

"He went after Edgar," Carol says. "They ended up outside. Gunther beat him. Badly. He may die."

"Oh Jesus." Thomas digs a hand into his auburn hair. "I hope he doesn't die. For Gunther's sake. Not Edgar's. I don't give a fuck what happens to him now."

"Edgar will hang if he's convicted." In Jamestown, there are three hanging offenses: first-degree murder, first-degree rape, and child molestation. And Carol's determined to make sure the man _is_ convicted. "I'm going to go talk to the men in suite B. Fill Earl in on what's going on when he gets here."

Thomas nods. Dwight and Shery come inside the suite from the dorm outside. He's in sweatpants and a white muscle shirt, while Sherry wears a nightgown, maybe because the material stretches comfortably over her pregnant stomach. She's due in August, another contributor to the ongoing baby boom. "They're taking that man to the infirmary," Dwight says. "What's going on?"

"I'm working on piecing it all together," Carol tells him. "You two should go back to bed. Get some sleep. For the baby." The last thing she needs is a bunch of curious onlookers while she's trying to put a case together.

Carol leaves Dwight and Sherry looking puzzled and walks down the short hallway that joins suite B. One of the bedroom doors is open, and two men are standing in the doorway, peering curiously inside. "Step back," she orders, and they do, parting ways for her. She looks inside. "Is this Edgar's room?"

"Yes, ma'am," one of them says. She recognizes him – the junior lieutenant – Donnie O'Dell.

"Did you touch anything?"

"No, ma'am," Donny replies.

She steps inside and looks around. The door frame is splintered. The deadbolt is extended but covered in flecks of wood and paint. Someone forced the door open. Gunther, probably, to get at Edgar. When and how Candy got away, or if Edgar merely let her go thinking she wouldn't talk, Carol doesn't know. But Candy probably ran, because she left her clothes. They're in a pool on the floor. Carol shuffles them around with her foot, then stoops to examine them. It looks like Candy may have begun to undress willingly, but it didn't end that way. Some of the undergarments are torn.

Items have scattered from off the top of the dresser to the floor – a comb, a toothbrush, a washcloth. Water from the wash basin has splashed and pooled onto the earthen floor, creating a spot of mud. It looks like maybe Edgar threw her against the dresser at some point.

Carol stands from her crouched position and turns to Donny. The other man who was with him has retreated. "Round up all men who live in this suite," she tells him, "and bring them to the common room for me. I want to interview them."

"Some of the men are still asleep," Donnie replies.

"Then wake them up."

"Do you want me to get Derek, too? He's on guard at the front gate."

"How long has he been on guard?" she asks.

"Three hours or so."

"Then no." He wasn't here to see or hear anything.

Donny gathers all the men from Suite B in the common room, except Edgar, of course, and the guard at the gate. Some of the men he has to bring in from the whispering crowd outside, and some from their bedrooms. He lights the candles in the candelabra, and Carol set her glowing lamp down on the kitchen counter. Two sailors slouch down on the couch in the living room, looking hung over, as if maybe they stumbled home from the tavern tonight. A fisherman and two farmhands sit in chairs at the adjoining kitchenette's table. Donny takes a seat on the stone ledge of the suite's unlit fireplace, leans forward, and laces his fingers together.

Carol begins her inquiry. The sailors, a pair of brothers, got in at 10:15 from the tavern, drunk, passed out in their shared double-room, and slept through it all, until Donnie just now dragged them out of bed. They know nothing. A fisherman admits to hearing noises, but says, "I just thought they were role playing."

"Role playing?" Carol asks thinly.

"I thought he paid her, you know. To role play."

"And why would you think that?" Carol asks.

The fisherman flushes. "I just know she role plays sometimes."

"Not like that," one of the farmhands says. "French maid type stuff. Cheerleader."

"Yeah," the other farmhand agrees. "She doesn't roleplay _rape_. What kind of freak would want to play that anyway?"

"Did either of _you_ hear anything?" Carol asks them.

Both farmhands shake their heads. "No ma'm," one says. "I was out like a light until Donnie woke me up. I sleep with earplugs in."

"I woke up when I heard someone banging against a door," the other farmhand says, "like he was throwing his whole body against it. I came out and saw Edgar's door busted in. I heard somebody shout at somebody. Then Edgar runs out of his room and out the suite door to the parking lot, with Gunther chasing him. I followed them out, and Gunther was just wailing on him. But I figured he had a good reason, so I didn't try to stop it. I mean…Gunther doesn't just beat people up."

"And how about you?" she asks the junior lieutenant.

Donnie, with some embarrassment, says, "I was out at the outhouse. I guess my dinner didn't sit right with me. I was there a _long_ time. When I came back, everyone was in the parking lot, watching you and Raul pull Gunther off of Edgar. I'm sorry, but I didn't see or hear anything."

Carol returns her attention to the fisherman. "But _you_ heard this going on, and you just ignored it?"

"I didn't know! Really! I mean, Edgar'd been bragging he found all this extra ammo, so I figured he hired her, and I thought…" The fisherman shrugs.

"I'll need you to testify about what you heard," Carol tells the fisherman.

"Do I _have_ to?" he asks.

Carol gives him a look of disbelief. "Why _wouldn't_ you?"

He swallows. "The defense attorney's got a job to do. He'll defend Edgar by attacking me as a credible witness."

"Well, that's what defense lawyers do. Your testimony will still be a useful part of the overall case."

"But he'll paint an ugly picture of me to do it. He'll bring up…" The man's eyes dart back and forth and he lowers his voice. "You know, all the times I paid Candy to…you know. I don't want that public!"

"I'm going to need you to testify," Carol says firmly. "You'll be subpoenaed, and I'd advise you not to lie on the stand if you don't want to be convicted of perjury."

The fisherman leans forward with his elbow on his knees and looks at the floor.

Irritated, Carol takes down their full names and room numbers. Then she returns to suite A, where she finds Sheriff Earl talking to Thomas. The door to Gunther's room is shut. "Fuck!" Thomas slams himself back against the wall of the suite. "We should have done more the first time we caught him peeping."

"We did what the law allowed," Earl says. "We had no idea he'd escalate to this."

"I had my fears," Carol admits as she joins them. "I just thought if he _did_ escalate, it would be more gradual. That we could get him on a second peeping charge before it got to anything else. I certainly didn't expect _this_." She hugs herself. "I feel guilty for not issuing a huge public warning of some kind."

"Don't," Earl tells her. "Candy knew about the peeping. I told her. But she must not have taken it seriously if she went to him anyway. She probably just saw it as harmlessly pathetic. I wish we'd done more, too. But what _could_ we have done? He hadn't touched anyone. The court punished him as much as the law allowed. If we'd done more, at the time, not knowing what we do now, it would have seemed draconian."

"How's Edgar?" Carol asks.

"Hanging in there," Thomas says. "He's in bad shape, so he'll probably be under arrest in the infirmary until his trial."

"And we can't have the trial until he's physically fit to stand trial," Earl says, "so it may be a couple days. Santiago is keeping an eye on him right now. Then I'll put Andrew on him in the morning. Then Sarah. But we should at least start the jury selection process. I'll contact Judge Annette in the morning to get the ball rolling. Why don't you go on home, Carol? Your shift was over an hour ago now."

"Are you arresting and charging Gunther?" she asks.

"I _have_ to." Sheriff Earl glances at the closed door of Gunther's room. Candy's crying penetrates the door and sends angry shivers up Carol's spine. "He almost killed that man. We don't tolerate vigilantism. Justice has to have its day. But hopefully the jury will just give him a slap on the wrist, like they did me. I just gave the captain a black eye, though. I didn't beat his head against the pavement."

"But Ana was perfectly willing," Thomas says, and when Earl shifts uncomfortably on his feet, he apologizes. "I didn't mean to- "

Earl holds up a hand. "You're right. All the more reason to think that Gunther might get a slap on the wrist."

"What if Edgar dies?" Carol asks.

"Let's hope he doesn't," Thomas replies. "Both Dr. Ahmad and Dr. Emily are in there treating him."

"Candy could probably use a friend tonight," Carol says. "I'll try to take down her full story tomorrow. I don't want to put her through that right now. It'll be easier to do if she's calm, and she'll be calmer if she can stay with Gunther. Do you have to put him in a cell? Can you just do the paperwork and release him on his own recognizance?"

Earl nods. "I think he can be trusted to show up for his court date."

"I'll stay with Candy just while you process Gunther," Thomas says. "She seems pretty comfortable with me."

"Good," Earl tells him. He sighs. "Let's go make the arrest." The two men head toward Gunther's room.


	160. Chapter 160

Carol keeps her cool until she's home and crawls into bed with Daryl, which is when she breaks down crying. The sound awakens him and he gathers her into her arms, murmuring, "'S wrong? 'S wrong?"

She tells him everything. She can feel the anger coursing through his muscles. He's spent enough time in that tavern now that she thinks maybe he's developed his own fondness for Candy, not quite like Gunther has – she's not family, not even really a friend, but she's still his people. "Gunther should of fuckin' killed 'em."

"It's better that Edgar lives. Then Gunther will be tried for assault instead of manslaughter."

"He ain't gettin' convicted either way, is he?"

"I don't know. We'll see what happens."

Daryl strokes her hair.

"I don't know if I can sleep," she says. "Will you light the fire and sit up with me for a while?"

"'Course."

After he lights the fire, low, because it's warm enough, Carol sets the kettle on. She gets down some cups and tea bags, and they sit on the couch sipping and talking more about what happened. "I feel so guilty for not doing _more_ about Edgar sooner."

"Ain't yer fault. What were ya gonna do? 'S just whackin' off in the bushes. Gonna hang 'em for that?"

"No, but I'm damn well going to make sure he hangs for _this_." She stares at the rippling surface of her tea and then takes a small sip. It forces her to be calm. You can't pound hot tea.

"Didn't know Gunther had it in 'em," Daryl murmurs. "Ain't never so much as heard 'em raise his voice 'fore. Never seen 'em kill a walker even."

"I'm sure he's killed walkers." Carol settles her head against Daryl's shoulder, and he doesn't have to be told she wants his arm around her. She falls asleep there, teacup still in her hand, but she wakes up the next morning, in bed, when Daryl presses his lips against her forehead.

A ray of sunlight, filtering through the thin space between the closed shutters, warms the spot he kissed when his lips are gone. He's dressed and lying on top of the sheet. "'S mornin'," he murmurs.

She yawns. "Shouldn't you be hunting already?" He was supposed to leave before sunrise today.

"Seems like ya need me 'round. Make up the hours later. C'mon. Made ya breakfast. Got Sweetheart locked in the highchair."

"You're so sweet to me," she tells him.

He strokes her cheek with the back of his fingers. "Let ya in on a little secret, Beautiful," he whispers.

"What?" she whispers back.

"I love ya."

Carol smiles as he leans in to kiss her softly, breaking away only when Sweetheart cries, "Dada! Dada! Dada!" from the kitchen.

Carol dresses while he returns to the kitchen, and when she comes out, Sweetheart is using a single finger to draw in applesauce on the tray of her highchair. "Mama!" she squeals when Carol sits down at the table.

"Hey, Sweetie," Carol says. "Are you going to eat any of that applesauce?"

Sweetheart puts the fingertip she's been using to draw in her mouth, sucks it, and says, "Mhmmmmm!" Then she returns it to the applesauce on her tray, swipes it through the mess, and swirls it around.

Daryl sets a plate in front of Carol with scrambled eggs and two strips of bacon. One of the pigs got old and fat enough to slaughter last week. Then he brings her a cup of coffee and sits down with his own cup.

"We still have coffee?" she asks.

"Traded Raul some of m'ammo for some of his crystals. Pays to be a bow hunter."

"And to never spend ammo practicing on the range?"

"Be fine if I ever gotta shoot a rifle again. Like ridin' a bike. Don't forget how."

Sweethearts sucks the applesauce off her fingertip again and then strikes her finger down on the tray and flings it back and forth. There's quite a bit of applesauce on there. "Did that _all_ fall off the spoon?" asks Carol, puzzled.

"Nah. Didn't feed 'er. Just dumped a quarter cup straight on the tray. She likes to eat it that way. 'N finger paintin' keeps 'er busy while 'm cookin'."

Carol smiles. "You sure have developed a lot of tricks of the trade." She looks at the empty spot before him on the table. "But where's your food?"

"Ain't 'nuff left for two. Must of miscalculated the rations this week when we had that big breakfast Wednesday."

Carol pushes her plate toward him. "Have some."

"Nah, I ain't hungry." His traitorous stomach growls.

"Daryl, have some."

"'S fine. Gettin' our new rations this afternoon anyhow."

Carol rips a piece of bacon in half and hands him half. Daryl accepts it reluctantly. He pops it into his mouth, chews on it suspiciously, and then swallows. "How come it's so much damn better when you make it?"

"Seasoning."

"What else?" he asks.

She shrugs. He's not a great cook, but he's not a bad one, and she doesn't like to discourage him with criticisms. He's cooked for himself most of this life, even when his parents should have been doing it. But for him it's always been a necessity instead of an art.

"Tell me. Ain't gonna be offended."

"You cook it just a little too long. But I appreciate you making breakfast, Pookie. It's nice to wake up to this. Thank you." She's done most of the cooking since they've been married, not just because she's better at it, but because she likes to do it. Even when he's grilling, she's usually the one who tenderizes, marinates, and seasons. She loves the way Daryl hums when he eats her food. Ed never said thank you for a meal. Ezekiel always overpraised her cooking, until he sounded almost insincere. But Daryl hums, the perfect compliment. The way to a man's heart, her mother always told her, is through his stomach.

Carol eats a full strip of bacon, two thirds of the scrambled eggs, and then pushes the rest over to him. "I'm full."

"No ya ain't."

"Eat!" she insists.

"Yum!" Sweetheart says, and then smacks her little lips together.

"A'right, well, if _both_ m'girls insist." Daryl drags the plate to himself, picks up the floppy scrambled egg between two fingers, and pops it in his mouth. Then he sucks his fingers clean one by one.

Sweetheart laughs. "Daaada!" Then she puts her own fingers in her mouth, one by one, and sucks them clean.

"Yum!" Daryl says.

"Yum!" Sweetheart cries.

"Yum, yum, yum, yum…" Daryl leans across the table, takes his daughter's hand, and pretends to eat her fingers, which sends her into tittering gales of laughter that lift Carol's heavy heart.

[*]

Gunther was arrested and charged last night, paid his own bail, and was released on his own recognizance until his trial, which has not yet been scheduled. Candy spent the night in Gunther's dorm room last night while he slept on a sleeping bag on the floor beside the bed. He's meeting with his defense attorney now, and then heading to work, so Carol is taking the opportunity to interview the waitress alone. It's uncomfortable having to put her through the story, but Carol does, and Candy haltingly shares all the information they'll need for the trial.

"Do I have to testify on the stand?" Candy asks. She's sitting up on Gunther's bed, dressed in her own clothes, which Linda brought over from the loft last night.

Carol sits in the chair at Gunther's cluttered desk. For a manager, he's surprisingly unorganized, but his system must work for him. "No, not if you don't want to. This is a formal deposition." Carol points to the legal pad where she's been taking down Candy's story. "We can just use this in court."

"Is anyone even going to believe me?" she asks. "I mean, I'm a _whore_."

"Everyone who matters already believes you," Carol assures her.

"The only people that matter are the jury."

"The prosecutor will make sure we get a good jury."

"Is Gunther going to be in trouble?" she asks.

"Gunther's going to have to go on trial for assault. But Earl went on trial for that, and look, he's doing fine."

"What if it's a big fat fine?" Candy asks.

"If the fine is large, I'm sure there are plenty of people who will help him pay it." Linda will probably take up a collection at the tavern, which will be filled in no time.

"Can he get any jail time?"

"Up to a maximum of five days, but that's unlikely." The system doesn't favor incarceration. The cells are mostly used to hold unruly drunks until they sober up, and not for punishment. After all, it just means feeding someone who isn't working. The cells might also be used to hold a dangerous criminal or a flight risk until his trial, but such cases are few and far between in Jamestown. Edgar would be in one now if he wasn't under guard at the infirmary. "He's more likely to get hard labor."

"What's the maximum on that?"

"For assault, up to five days."

"And for manslaughter?" Candy asks.

"Edgar's still alive."

"For now," Candy says. "Thomas stopped by to check on me. He said Edgar's in and out of consciousness. So you tell me, and you tell me straight - what's the maximum sentence for manslaughter?"

"Well, the _maximum_ sentence would be banishment, but he'd never get that."

"Oh God!" Candy cries.

"He'd never get that! Especially with no strikes against him!"

"Well, he's got the one strike."

"For what?" Carol asks. Gunther's certainly never been arrested since she's been here.

"Assault. This would actually be his second assault charge."

"Really?" Carol asks skeptically.

"It was four years ago. Gunther was drunk. Someone said something about Megan, called her a whore. Which, granted, she _was_. But it was the _way_ he said it. Anyway, Gunther didn't like it. He was in love with her, and they got into it. Well, Gunther got into it. He decked him good, twice, and the man just fell to the ground. Two-punch knockout. You know Gunther used to be an amateur boxer?"

"I had no idea."

"Hobby of his when he was a young man. I don't guess he kept up with it once he had the twin boys. Those are their shoes." Candy points to the bronze-dipped baby shoe bookends that hold together the row of books on the shelf above the desk. "Of all the things to take when you flee your farm for the naval camp at Jamestown! I mean, he took the shotgun and shotgun shells, too, and any of the food and seeds that were left. But he made sure he fit those in his pick-up. It's kind of heartbreaking, really."

Carol has a necklace she made from Sophia's hair bauble. She doesn't wear it often anymore, but she's kept it this whole time. She thinks of it now, sitting in the top drawer of her dresser. She thinks of her lost daughter. The sadness is mixed with gratitude for the daughter who's home with Daryl right now. "Who did he assault?" she asks. Carol wants to suggest to the prosecutor that man shouldn't be on Gunther's jury.

"Your ex."

"My what?" Carol asks in confusion.

"Commander Harold Harrison. Rumor is you dated him in high school."

"Oh." Well, she doesn't have to worry about him being on the jury. "Gunther knocked him out with just two punches?" Harold was a big man. She had to stab him more than once to bring him down.

"I told you Gunther was an amateur boxer. He knows where and how to hit."

That's unfortunate, Carol thinks. The prosecutor will probably bring that up in the trial – a boxer should have known how much damage he could do to Edgar, a boxer should have known how to take him down without so much damage, a boxer shouldn't have been slamming his head into the pavement. He'll also probably cite Gunther's tendency to lose his cool over insults to women he cares about, even if it's only happened twice in four years and even if, this time, that insult was a brutal rape.

"I know," Candy says, "Gunther doesn't seem the type. He's such a homebody. And so mild most of the time. And all that boring _farming_. Strong arms though. Strong as Daryl's, if you really look at them. Not that I look at your husband's arms. Often." Candy smiles. That smile is a ray of sunshine in the gloomy morning, but then her face grows stern again. "I brought this on myself."

"No. No!" Carol told herself that far too many times in her marriage to Ed. She _believed_ it, which was why she stayed. "You cannot blame yourself for that asshole's - "

"- Gunther wanted me to stop turning tricks. Linda, too. Even Trisha. They said it wasn't as safe without the whorehut, without a madam there to monitor everything. And I was making good money just waitressing. I should have listened to them. Earl even told me Edgar was a perv. I just thought - "

"- Candy, it's not your fault!"

"Most of these men," she continues, "they're just lonely. They want a little sexual release, sure, but they want company, too. They're just so damn lonely! And I _like_ making them feel less lonely. I don't do it just for the liquor and the ammo to buy liquor. Hell, I might do it for nothing but the smile on their faces. These men, they all had families at one time. People they lost. Sisters. Mothers. Daughters. Wives. Girlfriends. They have these holes in their hearts, and if they can fill them for just a little while with a little fun…" Candy swipes at the tears beneath her eyes. "I guess I just thought maybe Edgar was lonely, too. But he wasn't. There's something deep and dark and ugly inside him."

"There is," Carol agrees. "And that has nothing to do with you or any choice you made. You understand that?"

Candy sniffles and nods.

"You might want to see the town psychologist," Carol suggests. "He's been really helpful for some people."

"That's what Raul told me. He brought me a muffin this morning. He baked them from all that flour and sugar he's hoarded in his footlocker. Such a sweet kid."

"Then you'll think about it?"

Candy nods. She lifts her splinted wrist. "What the hell am I gonna do now? I can't waitress like this. It's my right hand, and I'm right-handed."

"I'm sure Linda will put you on light duty until you're healed, and the council will keep paying your full rations."

Candy stands. "I'm ready to go back to the tavern. Back to my own room in the loft. I can't be cooped up in here crying all day. I got to say busy or it's all I'm going to think about. Maybe I can at least wipe down tables in the tavern."

Carol nods. "I'll walk back with you."

On the walk down the docks, Carol can feel the eyes of the sailors and fishermen and fish cleaners on Candy – most of them sympathetic and worried for her, a few, perhaps, skeptical of the veracity of her story, and others afraid that their own secret dealings with her will come to light in the trials that are about to unravel.


	161. Chapter 161

"Moooo!" Sweetheart calls to the cows in the cattle pen.

Daryl shifts her on his hip, where he's holding her with one arm. "Go on!" he tells Dog, who wiggles under the lower bar of the wooden post and rail fence and takes off barking toward Gunther. The canine jumps up on Gunther, who scratches him behind his ears. Gunther says something to Dog, and then to one of his farmhands. Dog runs off alongside some cows, jumping and barking, as another herd dog does the same on the other side of the pen.

Meanwhile, Gunther walks over to the fence. "Thought you weren't going to let me use him for herding today?"

"Changed m' mind," Daryl says. "Ain't huntin'."

Gunther leans on the fence and coos, "Hey, Sweetheart."

"Mooo!" she says.

"Yep. A cow goes moo." Gunther shakes her little bare foot. It's warm today, and Daryl didn't see the point of bothering with shoes. He never wore shoes in the late spring or summer when he was a boy, unless he was going deep in the woods.

"Hey man, heard what happened. Sorry."

"Yeah," Gunther mutters.

"Listen, 's there's anything I can do – "

"- There's not. Well, there _is_. Bring a letter to Dianne from me when you go to Oceanside. I can't leave until my trial's over. And it's probably not even going to happen for a few days. They want to see if Edgar lives or dies, so they know what to charge me with."

Daryl nods. "I will."

"You should put shoes on her."

"Why? Ain't cold."

"Hookworm."

Daryl looks down at Sweetheart's bare feet. "Hookworm? Never got hookworm as a kid."

"You had modern sanitation."

Daryl shrugs. "Sometimes." They had an outhouse, too, for when the indoor plumbing wasn't working, or the water got shut off because the bill wasn't paid.

"It's too easy to get hookworm if she walks around," Gunther says, "steps on some contaminated dirt. And with all these outhouses around here, and all these animals…well, I wouldn't risk it."

"Yeah, well, I ain't 'fraid of a little dirt, and ain't no kid of mine gonna be 'fraid neither."

Gunther shrugs his dark eyebrows and stands straight. He glances back at the field hands and dogs and murmurs, "I've never killed a man."

Daryl's not sure what to say to that.

"Seems impossible in this world, I know." Gunther turns back. "But I just had to kill walkers the first few months to survive. And after I made it to Jamestown, I just farmed. Even when we were attacked by Shannon's old people? By the time I got hold of my shotgun and got down to the fray, it was already all over. They didn't send me to fight that last group. They didn't want to lose one of the farm managers. If Edgar dies, this'll be a first for me. And it wasn't even in self-defense."

"Hell, I'd of done the same."

"I lost control. I came after him. He even ran. And still I _chased_." Gunther swallows and shakes his head. "I'd never seen Candy wail like that. Not even when Captain John Smith died."

Daryl remembers that. He didn't know Candy by name back then, but she threw herself on the man's coffin.

Gunther lets out a long sigh. "Carol seems to think I'm going to get a slap on the wrist. But I don't think she understands how little Jamestown appreciates vigilantism."

"Man, this town ain't gonna throw the book at ya. Yer too valuable, 'n Edgar's too worthless. Get some men on that jury, with wives and daughters? Hell, man. They'll all be thinkin' they'd of done the same thing. 'Specially if you get some on there with wives and daughters he peeped on."

"He peeped on somebody's wives and daughters?"

"While they was bathin' in the river."

"Well that wasn't public knowledge."

"Quiet plea deal," Daryl says.

Gunther grits his teeth. "If Candy had known – "

"- She knew," Daryl tells him. "Carol says Sheriff Earl told her awhile ago."

Gunther shakes his head. "She's got no sense sometimes, that girl. God, I wish she had a decent man to look out for her. I can't keep doing it. Clearly, I _failed_ at it."

"'S got to learn to look out for 'erself."

"I suppose Carol would have ripped his chest wide open with a hairpin if he'd attacked her."

"Pft." Daryl doesn't disagree. Not a hairpin, of course, but she'd have found something.

"Well, I best get to work. Thanks for the loan. He's a good herd dog. And he'll get fish bits for his trouble. He loves the eyes."

Daryl grimaces.

"Good for the brain," Gunther assures him. He taps the rail of the fence and then strolls over to his horse, which he mounts to take up the rear of the milling cattle as they're herded out to pasture.

Sweetheart fusses and tries to squirm to the ground. Daryl bounces her on his hip. "'S go get ya some shoes, baby girl. Then we'll pick mama some wildflowers."

"Mama!" Sweetheart cries, and looks around like she thinks maybe Daryl meant Carol was near.

"'N then ya can go play with Gary, huh?"

"Gay!"

"Yeah, he's gonna want ya to stop callin' 'em that when he's older."

[*]

After Carol sees Candy to the tavern, she goes to the chapel courthouse for the preliminary meeting regarding the upcoming trials. Edgar's case is the biggest since the mutiny of 7 NE, and a number of people are present – Sheriff Earl, Deputy Santiago, Deputy Thomas, the young Judge Annette and her much younger apprentice Oliver, the defense attorney, James (who shares a first name with Commander James Witherspoon), his apprentice Ryan, the prosecutor Marcus (who shares a first name with the fisherman and speedboat skipper Marcus), and his apprentice Brandon. Carol's still adjusting to knowing more than one person with the same name. That's one of the pitfalls of living in a community of more than a hundred and fifty people. Marjory, the court reporter, who is older than all three apprentices combined, is also present.

Carol hands Marjory Candy's deposition to make two copies by hand – one for each lawyer. The original will go in the filing cabinet in the jailhouse. Marcus plucks the deposition from Marjory's hand, saying, "Let me just skim that." Carol takes a seat in the pew next to Santiago. Those in the front pew are half turned to face those in the pew behind them.

"Can you give me a report on the status of Edgar's health?" Judge Annette asks.

"Still in and out of consciousness," Deputy Santiago replies. "Deputy Andrew's on guard now."

"Edgar's case is first on the docket," Annette says, "and then Gunther's."

"My apprentice will be taking the lead in defending Gunther," James says.

"What?" Carol asks. Ryan is only eighteen years old. He's shadowed the defense attorney for years now, and served as his clerk full-time, but he's still just eighteen years old. Carol wants the best defense possible for Gunther. "That's not fair!"

"He needs the practice," James explains. "And it's not a major case."

"It is to Gunther!" Carol insists.

"If it's any consolation, Carol," Marcus tells her, "My apprentice will also be prosecuting in that case. James and I will be supervising them."

Carol glances at Brandon. He looks to be a bit older than Ryan, in his early twenties.

"Thomas and Carol," Judge Annette says, "I'll need both of you to testify at both trials, as you were the first on the scene. I'm afraid you can't leave Jamestown until the trials are over."

That means no trip to Oceanside, but Carol understands the necessity and nods.

"Should we set some kind of drop-dead date for the trial?" Oliver, the judge's new, thirteen-year-old apprentice, asks her. "I mean, what if Edgar is in and out of consciousness for a month?"

"He won't be," Thomas replies. "The doctors won't be able to keep him alive that long if he is. In a week, at most, he'll be either alive and fit to stand trial, or dead."

"Has the prosecution decided on its final charges?" Annette asks.

"Not for Gunther," the apprentice Brandon answers. "Obviously those will depend on the outcome of Edgar's condition."

"But for Edgar," Marcus says, "we'll be prosecuting for first degree rape and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon – "

"What's the deadly weapon?" the defense attorney interrupts.

"Read the deposition. I just did." Marcus hands the paper to him. "He slammed her against the dresser."

"A dresser is not a deadly weapon."

"Well, that's for the jury to decide."

The defense attorney shakes his head.

"So I take it you two haven't been able to discuss plea bargains?" the judge asks. "Since Edgar isn't entirely with it?"

"The prosecution will not accept any plea in this case," Marcus insists. "We'll be seeking capital punishment. So unless Edgar wants to plea to a hanging -"

"- We'll take the jury trial," the defense attorney interrupts.

"What about a plea for Gunther?" Carol asks.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," James says. "I need to know the charges first."

The meeting wears on. A court date is tentatively set for two days from now, but it will depend on whether or not Edgar is fit to stand trial. Gunther's trial will follow Edgar's verdict, with a two-day break between to allow the attorneys time to prepare.

[*]

Carol opens the door of the cabin to find Daryl sitting on the living room couch and cleaning her AR-15. Sweetheart is nowhere in sight. A medley of yellow, purple, and white wildflowers spring up from a mason jar on the center of the kitchen table. Next to the mason jar full of flowers, there's an unopened bottle of wine. He must have bought it from Oceanside at the trade fair and hidden it from her all these months, because she's never seen it before. She clicks the door shut, and Daryl says, "Baby's at the Barrons'. Playdate with Gary."

Daryl rarely brings her flowers. He reserves that token of affection for the times when she's extremely upset. He doesn't typically clean her firearms unless she asks. And entire bottles of wine are not something that's usually in their budget. It's all very strange.

"You're being _really_ sweet," she says as she unclips her knife from her belt and lays it on the mantle. She unfastens her holster next, gun still inside.

"Well…'s our anniversary."

Carol's hand, which is holding the holstered gun, freezes halfway to the mantle. "Today?"

He slides the cleaning rod out of the barrel of her disassembled rifle. "Ain't it?"

She sets her holstered gun down and then takes off her second sheath and knife. "Yeah, it _is_ today." When she's stripped of her weapons, she plops down next to him on the couch. "I'm so sorry. I completely forgot."

"Ya got shit on yer mind."

"So do you. I can't believe you remembered."

"Well ya only mentioned it six times last week. Like ya was 'spectin' somethin'."

She turns to gaze at the flowers. "They're beautiful. Thank you." She kisses his cheek. "Normally, I'd put on something sexy for you - "

"- But ya ain't in the mood. I get it." He starts reassembling her gun. There's a click, click, click, clack, click and then he hands the weapon to her. "Happy Anniversary."

"Thanks, Pookie. I love you."

"I know."

She leans over and kisses him. Then she goes and hangs her rifle in the clips over the fireplace. "I'll make it up to you later, I promise. Anything you want in bed."

"Yeah?" he asks with a grin. " _Anything_?"

"Another day."

"Wanna save the wine for 'nother day?"

"No. I think I need a glass tonight when Sweetheart's in bed. It's been a day."

He pats the couch cushion next to himself, and she sits back down. He slings an arm around her. "Tell me 'bout it."

She does. And then she tells him she has to stay to testify for both trials.

"So we ain't goin' to Oceanside?" he asks.

"I'm not," she tells him. "You still are. Raul's counting on you to take him to the Hilltop. And you already sent a letter telling Hershel you'd be there. He'll be heartbroken if he doesn't get to see his Uncle Daryl. Just give Henry a hug for me."

"Ya sure?"

She nods. "It'll only be eight or nine days."

"Only?" he mutters. "Gonna be damn horny when I get back, ya know."

She smiles. "I know. After seeing all those gorgeous Oceanside women."

He glowers. "Ain't what I meant. Gonna miss ya."

"I'm going to miss you, too. Even though we're an old married couple now."

"Two years ain't that long."

"I didn't say the _marriage_ was old." She slaps a hand down on his knee. "I said _we_ were."

"Nah. We ain't never getting' old."

Carol smiles. She cranes her neck to look up at him. "We _are_ newlyweds still. What are you going to do when you hit the seven-year itch?"

"Guess 'm gonna make ya scratch m'back. Good n' hard."

Carol splutters out a laugh. Daryl smirks. She kisses him, and though it begins affectionately at first, the kiss soon deepens into something more serious. Eventually, Daryl pulls away. "Gotta get Sweetheart. Promised Shannon I'd only leave 'er an hour."

"You were only giving us an hour to screw around?"

"Knew ya weren't gonna wanna screw around."

Carol shrugs. He's right, although the kissing was getting her worked up a little. But her mind's too full with the current cases to pay Daryl the attention he deserves. She slides away from him and stands. "I'll get dinner started while you go get her."


	162. Chapter 162

One glass of wine becomes two that night as Daryl and Carol sit on the couch and Sweetheart slumbers behind closed drapes. The fire crackles, and Carol shrugs out of her sweatshirt because it's too warm. Daryl's eyes glide over the tight-fitting tank top she has on underneath.

"Thinking dirty thoughts?" Carol teases.

He licks his lips, and she's not sure if it's because he has a drop of wine on one or because he likes what he sees. "C'mere," he says. "Scoot a little closer."

Smiling, she does, and when he leans in to kiss her, she lets the cares of the day slip away. Carol rests a hand against his cheek and enjoys the taste of him and the tender exploration of his tongue. Eventually, he urges her to straddle him where they sit, and he cups one of her breasts through the thin fabric of her shirt and gently squeezes before sliding a thumb over her hardening nipple.

She murmurs her pleasure and tells him, "I don't think you're going to have to wait for that anniversary present after all."

"Nah?"

"No. Just tell me what you want."

"Want it like this," he murmurs in her ear. "You ridin' me right here."

"That's all?" she asks.

"I ain't kinky."

"You're a man of simple tastes," Carol says as she pulls off her tank top and tosses it on the ground. "I like that about you." Her lips go to that sensitive place on his neck, and he thrusts up against her and groans. "You're easy," she teases.

"Ain't done yet," he murmurs as one hand kneads a bare breast and the other pops the button on her pants. "Hardly started."

[*]

The wind howls. Thunder peels across the sky. Rain slams against the shaking shutters and pitter-patters the roof. Feet pitter-patter across the cabin floor. "Uh oh uh oh uh oh. Mama uh oh uh oh."

Carol hauls Sweetheart up into bed. The toddler burrows beneath the sheets between her and Daryl. "Just a storm, Sweetie," Carol assures her daughter. "We're all safe and dry." Sweethearts rolls toward her mother and lays her warm little hand on Carol's arm. Carol closes her eyes and soon drifts back to sleep.

She's awakened a few hours later by a fart-like sound followed by a peel of cackling, little girl laughter. "Daaaada!" Carol opens one eye and sees Sweetheart make the baby sign for _more_ by pushing her fingers together.

Daryl pushes up Sweetheart's shirt again and blows another huge, loud raspberry on the bare, ticklish flesh of her stomach. She squeals with laughter and squirms. Carol reaches over and lightly slaps the top of Daryl's head.

He lifts his neck to look at her. "Hell's that for?"

"I was hitting the snooze button."

"A'right, a'right. C'mon, baby girl. Mama wants to sleep some more." Daryl slides out of bed, drags a laughing Sweetheart to the edge of the bed by her ankle, and then plucks her up and tosses her over his shoulder. The drapes close around their bedroom.

When Carol drags herself out of bed twenty minutes later, dresses, and emerges from behind the drapes, Daryl is snapping up his hunting pack. Sweetheart is in her highchair and rolling her sippy cup, which is on its side, back and forth on the tray table. "Fed her," Daryl says. "'S coffee in the press if ya want some. Gotta get goin'."

Carol walks to him, kisses him on the cheek, and says, "Thank you for letting me sleep in a bit."

"Mhmm…Well…" He grins like he can't help the smile. "Thanks for last night."

She smiles. "It was good wasn't it?"

"Damn good," he growls and kisses her.

Carol pulls away at the sound of dripping. Water plop-plops onto the logs in the fireplace, and a bit of liquid oozes out onto the stone hearth. "Uh…Daryl?"

"Noticed. Check it when I get back. Chimney cap probably lost its seal. I'll fix it."

"I could just get Inola to fix it." She's the one who built the chimney after all.

"Woman's pregnant! She don't need to be climbin' on roofs. I'll fix it."

"Oh…yeah. I forgot about that. _Everyone's_ pregnant."

Daryl narrows his eyes.

"Not _me_ ," Carol clarifies.

"Good. 'Cause Sweetheart's 'bout all I can handle. Can barely handle her sometimes."

Carol chuckles. "Trust me. I'm past that now. On the plus side…no more periods ever again."

"Good. More sex for me."

"That's not how that works," she tells him as he plucks his crossbow from off the door and swings it on his back.

"Think it is," he says and opens the door.

"Be safe," she tells him.

"'M always safe. How ya think I've made it this long?"

"Well, I think sometimes you've just been lucky."

"Yeah?" he asks. "Should tell me be lucky then."

"Be lucky."

"Mhm." He slips out the door and clicks it shut behind himself.

"Uh oh," Sweetheart says from her highchair. "Uh oh. Dada. Uh oh. Bye bye."

"Dada will be back," says Carol, turning to her, "but I think that's your first three-word sentence. It's going down in the book."

[*]

The birds always sing loudest after a storm, Daryl thinks. The forest is a concert hall today. Mitch must be thinking the same thing as they load the field dressed deer onto the drag sled, because he asks, "What's the best live concert you ever went to? And where were you, and what year was it?"

Daryl cinches the rope holding the deer in place. "The Mason Brothers band. The tavern. 9 NE."

"I meant before all this."

"Look like I had money to go to concerts?" Daryl grumbles. When he sees Mitch's expression, he apologizes. "Sorry." He's learned that sometimes people are just making polite conversation, and he doesn't have to react to everything like it's a personal insult. He's _mostly_ learned that, anyway. That old chip on his shoulder has been whittled away, gotten smaller and smaller over the years, but it's still there. "Free concert in the park, in this suburb of Atlanta where me and Merle were workin' stainin' fences. Went to it after we got done one day. Some band. Singer was sexy as hell. Merle dragged me up there to stage, and he tried to chat her up durin' the break. Was goin' okay 'til someone called the cops on us."

"What for?" Mitch asks as he picks up one of the ropes of the drag sled and slings it over his shoulder.

"Lookin' like white trash in an upper-middle class suburb." Daryl slings the other rope over his shoulder. Dog takes up the rear to guard the field-dressed carcass of the deer. He'll give them a bark if he senses a walker. They begin to drag their trophy back to camp.

"Oh, I thought that only happened to black people in white neighborhoods."

"Pffft. All sorts of prejudice in the old world."

There's all sorts in this world, too, but it's different. Now it's the clean-cut, well-mannered people who are suspicious. You wonder how they've survived, and you don't trust them to have your back. But some of them, like Garland, who dresses well for court and speaks calmly and plays the gentle father, would kill you before you even knew he had you in his sights if he thought you were a threat to his family. Even Gunther, that mild farmer who almost never leaves the gates, can nearly slay a man with his bare hands – and will – if you cross someone he cares about. That kind of prejudice isn't just unfair in this world. It's dangerous.

"What did the cops do? Just tell you to leave the park?"

"If only. Patted Merle down, 'n he had a little meth on 'em of course. Had to spend all our money for the whole damn week we made stainin' fences to bail 'em out. Should of let 'em sit there 'til the trial."

"Was he convicted?"

"Nah. Not that time. Unconstitutional search. Didn't have no reason to pat 'em down. Evidence got thrown out of court." They pause to get the deer over a fallen tree log, which requires some finagling, and then drag on. "So what's the best concert ya ever went to?"

"Elton John," Mitch answers.

"Oh, Jesus, of course."

"What's wrong with Elton John?"

"Them damn outfits. Man wore a fuckin' bathrobe on stage."

Mitch laughs. "Only sometimes."

"Goddamn pink pants."

"Not always."

"Sparkly eyeglasses."

"So it's the clothes you don't like?" Mitch asks. "You're okay with the music?"

"His music don't suck. Not that I ever listened to it."

"Oh, no, of course not," Mitch says with a smirk. "Merle would have beat you up if you admitted you liked Elton John, huh?"

"Nah. Just would of mocked me."

"Merle like Lynyrd Skynard, I suppose."

They emerge from the tree line and head down the road. "Ya ain't wrong 'bout that. Swear to God, if I have to hear Free Bird one more time in my knife, 'm gonna cut somebody."

Mitch smiles. "So who was your favorite band?"

"Zeppelin."

"Oh, yeah, I could see that." Mitch glances over his shoulder at the deer. "It seems so small after that last elk."

"Get eighty pounds of meat out of 'em." Jamestown goes through about a 170 pounds of meat a day, which is five ounces a person on average. A good portion of that is fish, but they also have game meat, rabbits from the rabbit farm, pigs bred for their meat, and the very occasional cow, goat, sheep, or chicken. Then there are beans, milk, cheese, and walnuts for additional protein. "Almost half of tomorrow's meat. Just from us."

"How much meat do you think Barry and John will bring back?"

"Pfft. Not as much." Those two, along with two other bird hunters, hunt duck, goose, pheasant, crow, quail, and grouse. Then there's a pair of trappers who typically come back with fox, groundhog, beaver, squirrel, and wild rabbit, which is what Mitch and Daryl snag when they can't get something bigger. Eight hunters for six hundred people isn't much, but they're past the hunting and gathering stage now. It's fishing and farming that really feeds the people, and one day hunting will probably be looked at as just a hobby to most people again. Mitch was right about what he said all those months ago – the sun is slowly setting on their kind. By the time Sweetheart's twenty, Daryl will be living in a world where he's no longer needed. Not even by her. He sighs.

"You all right?" Mitch asks.

"Yeah. 'S been a weird week is all."

"Sure has," Mitch murmurs in agreement. "How's Edgar? Have you heard?"

"Not dead," Daryl says. "Not ready to stand trial yet neither."

"Gunther was drinking in the tavern last night. Not tea."

"Shit."

"Yeah. He said it was just the one, to calm his nerves. Maybe it was. He switched to water after that. Of course, Madam Linda came in after that and said something about him not wanting to become an alcoholic again and maybe piss away his chances with Dianne. And he said what if I already have?"

"Pffft. Dianne ain't gonna care he beat the shit out some rapist."

"That's what Candy told him. She said she's done turning tricks for good, and she wants to learn how to do the books from Madam Linda while she's healing up and help her out more. This terrible thing could turn out to yield something positive in the end. Good from evil."

"Maybe so," Daryl murmurs. "Seen it happen before. That good from evil thing. More 'n once."

[*]

A foul string of curse words swirls down through the chimney and into the cabin. "Uh oh!" Sweetheart says, dropping her block and looking up at the mantle. "Uh oh!"

"Daddy's just fixing the chimney cap," Carol says as she sits in the rocking chair and crochets some booties for Sweetheart. The baby's feet are getting bigger, and she's about to outgrow her shoes. The ones in storage are a size too big, so she can't wear them just yet. "Get used to his language. Just don't use it _yourself_. You need to reserve your f-bombs like rare jewels. Then when you throw one, it has power. People know you mean business. Trust me on that one."

Sweetheart puts another block on her tower.

There's some more cursing from above, then clattering on the roof, then the door opens and Daryl stomps in and grabs the bucket they use to fetch water from the hand pump and disappears out the door. "What do you think Daddy's going to do with that?"

"Dada! Bye bye dada." Sweetheart puts another block on the tower and it topples over. "No! No! No!"

"Just rebuild it. That's what we Dixons do. We rebuild and we rebuild until it finally stands."

Sweetheart centers one block in front of herself. Then she sets one block on top of another. She's made her way to three blocks when there's a strange sound, as if something has hit the chimney. Then, a minute later, Daryl's voice, drifting down the flute: "Any water drippin' down there?"

"No," Carol calls back. "All clear in here!"

"Fuck yeah!" Daryl cries.

"Fffffff!" Sweetheart echoes. "Ffff! Yay!"

Carol shakes her head and smiles. "You're going to be your daddy's girl, aren't you?


	163. Chapter 163

The next evening, Carol's on guard duty in the infirmary until eight in the evening. Edgar's having longer, more wakeful moments, and he's been eating on his own. At the moment, he is, however, thankfully asleep. Carol's reading in a chair near the bed when there's movement in the hallway. She shuts her book, stands, and encounters Candy at the open doorway. "What are you doing here?" she asks. "Are you ill?"

"I just wanted to talk to him."

"Edgar?"

Candy peers around Carol into the infirmary. "I'm not going to _do_ anything to him," she insists, though there's an angry fire in her eyes.

"Candy, you need to go on home."

"I just want to _talk_ to him. Let him know that what he did isn't – "

"- Candy, it's not going to help you. Besides, Edgar needs to rest and recover so he can go on trial. Then Gunther can go on trial and get it over with and get on with his life. The poor man's in limbo right now."

Candy sighs.

"Edgar will have his day on the gallows. Believe me."

"What if he gets acquitted? Or what if he just gets sentenced to a week of hard labor, and I have to see him _every day_ of my life?"

"He won't," Carol insists.

"You don't know that! He'll say I agreed to it! That he paid me for it! And why wouldn't people believe that?"

"Because the evidence says otherwise. Marcus is a good prosecutor."

"Yeah, well, James is a good defense attorney," Candy counters. "He got you and Daryl off the first time you were here, didn't he?"

"We didn't rape anybody."

"You _killed_ somebody though," Candy says.

"An escaped convict. Not someone anyone would miss. And we were only applying for release."

Candy takes a step forward as if to enter the infirmary, and Carol moves slightly to block her. That's when Deputy Thomas comes down the hallway. "Hey, Candy," he says cautiously, "What are you doing here?"

"Carol won't let me in to see Edgar."

"Well, there's a reason for that," he tells her calmly. He puts a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, come on, I'll walk with you back to the tavern. I'll buy you a drink."

"Yeah?" she asks.

"I mean, if Carol doesn't mind staying a bit longer?"

Thomas was coming to relieve her, but she'll stay longer, if it means Candy is steered clear of Edgar and has the comforting presence she needs from Thomas. "Go on," she tells them. "I'll get Dr. Emily if he needs anything."

Thomas slides an arm around Candy's waist and leads her away.

[*]

When Thomas finally returns to relieve Carol, it's two hours later. "How's Candy?" she asks.

"Angry," he answers. "And self-blaming at the same time. She goes back and forth. I just let her get it all out. Just talk."

"You're a good friend to her."

"I think she's going to be all right. She's tough. The things she went through before she got to Jamestown…She'll survive this, too. Sorry I took so long."

"It sounds like it was worth it," Carol replies. "She needed someone tonight. But she should really see a trained counselor. Maybe you can convince her? She seems to trust you."

"We talked about it. She said she will, starting tomorrow."

When Carol gets home twenty minutes later, after strolling past the docks and fields and into the settlement, Daryl is pacing the small living room of their cabin. "Got to tell me when yer workin' late!" he growls.

"I'm sorry. Something came up. I thought you'd have gone to sleep by now." He's usually in bed by nine, because of the early morning hunting.

"'Spected ya home over two hours ago! Would of gone lookin', but I couldn't leave the baby."

"I'm sorry. Things come up, sometimes, Daryl. They do for you, too." She comes over and puts a hand on his shoulder. She can feel the tension in his muscles, still. "You never used to worry like this. Even when the world was a lot more dangerous. Did you think Edgar had attacked me?"

"Didn't know what to think. Ya weren't home when ya said ya'd be. Just worried is all."

Carol wraps her arms around his neck. He slides his around her waist and presses his forehead to hers. "I can't believe you've gotten used to schedules," Carol says. "Are you really that settled now?"

"Settled as 'm ever gonna be. Weird. Makes me more nervous 'stead of less."

She pulls back. "It's because you have the _luxury_ to worry now." She smiles slightly. "You're not going to worry about me the whole time you're on the trade trip, are you?"

"Nah." He smirks slightly. "'Cause I ain't gonna notice when ya ain't home."

She chuckles and tugs on his hand. "Come on. Let's go to bed."

[*]

Carol deposits Sweetheart at the drop-in daycare in the museum to go to the council meeting the following morning. Sherry is toward the end of her second trimester now, and Carol's glad to see she has a teenager to help her out with the kids. There are six at the moment, including VanDaryl, which must mean Shannon's busy and Gary's at preschool.

"Vee Dee! Vee Dee!" Sweetheart cries and toddle-runs over to the little boy, who is standing with support from a plastic play table. He hasn't taken off walking on his own yet, but he's getting there. VanDaryl smiles and bounces at his knees. When Sweetheart gets to the table, he spins a roller on its surface, as though to show it off to her. Sweetheart hip checks him to take over the spot, and he falls to his bottom as she begins to spin the roller herself.

"Sweetheart!" Carol scolds her. "VanDaryl was playing with that!" But VanDaryl just crawls around to the other side of the table, pulls himself up on it, and plays with something there.

"She's fine," Sherry says. "None of them know how to share at this age. And VanDaryl's tolerant. A little too tolerant, really. But he seems happy."

He may be tolerant, Carol thinks, but as with his father, there are wheels turning calculatedly beneath the quiet surface. She sees it now as VanDaryl smiles sneakily, leans forward, reaches his arm all the way across the table, and spins the roller Sweetheart has usurped.

"No!" Sweetheart says, and without a sound, VanDaryl spins it again.

[*]

Dr. Ahmad pulls out his pocket watch and says, "This meeting was supposed to start five minutes ago, wasn't it?"

"He'll be here," Thomas assures him.

As if on cue, Garland walks into the council chambers and closes the door. He takes a seat hurriedly at the table and tosses his file folders down in front of himself.

"Your barn door's open," Barry tells him.

Flushing, Garland reaches down to yank up his zipper. Carol now has a sneaking suspicion about why VanDaryl was in daycare and Garland was late. Shannon must have paid one of her special office visits.

Garland flicks open a file folder. "Carol and Gunther aren't going to be on the ship to Oceanside, so we have an extra slot to fill. I'd suggest that fisherman who almost made the cut, Marvin, and that farmhand, Grayson? All in favor?"

All nine hands go up.

"So that's settled." He closes the file folder and sets it aside. "Any news on your trial date yet, Gunther?"

"No." Gunther rubs his eyes. "Would it be easier for y'all if I just stepped down from the council _now_? With all the rumors that are flying, and - "

"- No," Carol interrupts. "You've been an invaluable contributor to this council."

"What if I'm convicted? Will I need to step down then?"

"There's nothing in the charter that says you have to," Garland assures him. "Seven members of the council would have to vote you off, like we did with Ana and the captain."

"For a far lesser reason," Gunther notes.

"No one wants to vote you off, Gunther," Garland assures him. He looks around at the other council members. "Right?"

There are nods all around, except for the shrug from Barry, who says, "The election is in less than two months anyway. It would be easier if you just stayed. Just don't run again."

"Why not?" Inola replies. "He _should_ run again."

"Can I," Gunther asks, "if I'm convicted of felony assault?"

Carol glances at Garland. She didn't see anything in the charter about a felony-free record. The only requirements for running for council is that you be at least twenty-one, a full citizen of Jamestown, and not have served more than six terms on the council already.

"You can," Garland replies, "unless a temporary suspension of rights is part of your sentence. That's sometimes the case in felonies. Your right to vote and to run for council could be withdrawn for up to one year."

Carol hopes he's acquitted or that, at most, he gets a misdemeanor assault conviction, like Earl did for punching Captain Cummins.

"I'll be running again for council," Garland continues. "But I can't serve as mayor, of course. Two-term limit. So all of you who plan to run for council again should seriously considered whether or not you might be interested in this role. I'll warn you, it's no easy task. There's a lot of detail work involved and a lot of hours. But you'll have the satisfaction of knowing you're helping Jamestown to sail smoothly."

"I'm not even running for council again," Barry says. "I've had enough of all these meetings."

"That and your daughter robbed the brewhouse, so you probably wouldn't win," Carolyn says.

"Well, at least I didn't almost _kill_ a man," Barry replies.

Gunther shifts uncomfortably in his chair.

"Enough, Barry," Garland says. "Who else plans to run for re-election to council?"

Everyone raises their hands except Barry, Inola, and Gunther. "I'm going to sit out a year for the baby," Inola says. "I'm due shortly after the election. But I'll probably run again the year after. You're really not going to?" she asks Gunther.

"Maybe," Gunther replies. "Maybe not. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. See how my trial pans out first."

"I'll throw my hat in for mayor again," Dr. Ahmad says. "Am I going to have any competition?"

"Me," Carolyn replies.

This announcement is greeted with some surprised looks and an _Oh_ from Garland.

"Why oh?" she asks.

"I just didn't know you were considering it," the mayor replies. "I think you'd make a fine mayor, Carolyn. You've been with us since the transition."

"But you don't think this town will elect a female mayor," Carolyn says matter-of-factly.

"This town is always surprising me," Garland replies.

Carolyn looks at Barry as if daring him to say something, but he just smirks and asks, "What?"

[*]

The next evening, after dinner, Daryl's in a tizzy as he packs for the trip to Oceanside. The ship will leave at sunrise tomorrow. "Hell' ya do with my little knife, woman?"

"I'm not in charge of your little knife. Or your big knife or any of your medium-sized knives," Carol insists as she dries the dishes. "And I'd prefer it if you not call me _woman_ like that."

"Why? Ya are a woman. Yer _my_ woman."

"Bad associations," she mutters.

"Oh," Daryl says softly. "Sorry."

"It's okay. You didn't know. Just…if you could try to avoid it?"

"Mhmhm."

"Did you check the back pocket of your other pair of Wranglers?"

Daryl does check the back pocket of his other pair of Wranglers, and his little knife is indeed in there. "Ya must of slipped in there when I wasn't lookin'," he tells her, and she rolls he eyes.

"You should take those pants, too," Carol tells him.

"Why? Only gonna be gone eight days."

"It would be nice for you to have something to change into if the pair you're wearing gets wet."

"'M fully potty trained." Daryl strokes Sweetheart's hair where she sits by the unlit fireplace stacking soft blocks. "Just like m' big girl." He squats down and kisses her on top of the head before springing up to continue his packing.

"She's not _fully_ potty-trained," Carol replies, "but she's certainly getting there." Sweetheart stays dry during the day now, but not always at night. Thank God for rubber mattress covers, but Carol will be glad when she has to wash the sheets less often. They get collected once a month and done in the museum machines by the laundry people, but she has to do Sweetheart's soiled sheets by hand at least once a week now. They've bought another plastic-wrapped set of sheets out of storage, so if it's not a good day for her to do laundry, she can at least wait a day. Jamestown thought to loot that Bed, Bath, & Beyond six years ago. The storehouse and the storage rooms in the museum are full of all sorts of linens. "And I meant if it rained or you fell in the ocean or something."

"Fell in the ocean?"

"Or _something_."

"Fine, if it'll stop yer nagging, I'll pack the damn pants." He plucks them up, rolls them, and shoves them in his pack. "Ain't gonna need 'em though."

"Mhmhm," Carol murmurs. "Sounds like you need a swift kick in the pants is what you need."

"Uh oh, dada. Uh oh!" Sweetheart says.

"Sweetheart don't like yer tone," Daryl tells her.

Carol stacks the dried plates on the hutch. "No. She senses you're in trouble."

"Hell 'em I in trouble for? Didn't do nothin'."

"You called me a nag," Carol says mildly.

"Didn't _call_ ya _a nag_. Said ya was _naggin'_. 'Cause ya _was_. Ain't that right, Sweetheart? Daddy's right, ain't he?"

Sweetheart grins and shakes her head and says, "No!"

"Damn. 'M outnumbered in this house. Surrounded by estrogen."

"Well, now that I'm past menopause, you're not surrounded by _as much_."

"Pfft."

"Wind up that ceiling fan, would you?" she asks as she hangs up the dishtowel. It's getting warm in this cabin now that it's mid-May.

He does, cranking the pullies for a good four or five minutes while she finishes cleaning up the kitchen. Sweetheart toddles over, sits down at his feet, and looks up at the fan as it begin to spin. "Fan," he tells her. "Fan. Faaaaaaaan."

"Fffffff."

"Don't forget to pack that big stack of letters." Carol points to the letters on top of the mantle, which are tied tightly with brown string.

Daryl lets go of the chain and goes to grab the thick bundle. He shoves them into his pack. It takes some finagling to fit them all in. "Jesus, 's thicker 'n three Stephen King novels. Why so many?"

Carol smiles. "They're not _all_ mine." She did write to Henry, however, and to her old Kingdom advisors Dianne, Jerry, and William. She also wrote to Michonne and the kids, Rosita, Tara, Enid, and Hershel. "There's one from Gunther to Dianne. One from Thomas to Charlotte. One - "

"- Thought she dumped Thomas?"

"She did, but I guess he wants the final word. There are letters from Garland to the leaders of the communities. There's one from Linda to Henry."

"Hell's Linda writing _Henry_ for?"

"Business advice," Carol explains. "He's got his mind set on opening that pub. And then there's all the letters from the school kids. They've been doing this penpal thing to practice writing. They each get assigned a penpal at one of the three communities who's around the same age. I think it's good for them. They get to know some kids in the Alliance. It might help unite the communities better."

"Ya think that up?" Daryl asks.

"I wish. The headmistress did. She asked the council to approve it at the open town hall last week. Did you ever have a penpal as a kid?"

"Pffft. Ain't never wrote a letter in m'life."

"You could write me one on this trip."

"Wouldn't get here 'fore I did."

"I know," she says. "But I might enjoy reading a letter from you."

"Hell for?"

"Never mind. A girl likes love letters is all."

Daryl glowers. "'Zeke write ya love letters?"

"Poetry," she tells him. She laughs. "It was really over-the-top. The metaphors were _terrible_." She pouts slightly. "I'm really going to miss you, Pookie."

Daryl comes over to where she stands and drags her against himself and kisses her.

Sweetheart claps.

Carol pulls away smiling. "We have an audience."

"So? 'S give 'er a show then." He yanks her against himself again and is leaning in to kiss her when there's a knock at the door.

Daryl pulls back, sighing. "Just wanted a quiet night with m'family 'fore I leave."

"It's almost Sweetheart's bedtime," Carol grumbles. Though she enjoys having _planned_ guests over, she's no more a fan of late evening intrusions than Daryl is. She goes to the door and opens it to find Deputy Thomas standing there.

He slides off his hat and toys with the brim. "Can I come in for a minute?"

Carol steps back to let him in and closes the door behind him. He looks around the cabin. "Lovely home you have here."

"Thank you. What is it?" Carol asks. "What's going on?"

He looks down and bends up the brim of his hat and then pops it down again. He sighs heavily. "At 5:55 PM this evening, Edgar Johnson slipped into a coma. At 6:45 PM, he stopped breathing. They're preparing the body for burial now. The prosecutor has submitted Gunther's final charges. Aggravated felony assault and voluntary manslaughter."


	164. Chapter 164

Carol sits in the back of the chapel during jury selection. Gunther's defense attorney petitioned to have the trial closed to the general public, and the prosecutor agreed, because of the "sensitive nature" of some of the information that might emerge during the proceedings. But as a witness, council member, _and_ a deputy of the Sheriff's Department, Carol is not a member of the "general public," and she's permitted to watch the proceedings.

Thankfully, the defense attorney decided not to leave this case to his apprentice after all, now that the charges have been revised to include voluntary manslaughter. Sixteen potential jurors have been brought in to be whittled down to a jury of six. They sit in the two front rows after being sworn in, while Gunther sits at the far end of the pew across the aisle from them. The defense attorney's apprentice sits beside him, taking notes and occasionally whispering some explanation in his ear.

Judge Annette, who sits behind the makeshift card table bench on the altar stage in her black robe, swears in the potential jurors, after which she says, "Juror number one, please rise for questioning."

Madam Linda stands up. The prosecutor, Marcus Washington, immediately rolls his eyes and says, "I move to dismiss this juror on grounds of overfamiliarity with the defendant. They've been close friends for years."

The judge approves, and as Linda exits the chapel, she pauses near Carol's pew in the back and whispers, "Keep me posted."

"Juror number two, please rise," Judge Annette announces. "State your name and occupation for the record."

The man rises with his straw hat in hands. "Adam Thompson. Farmhand."

The prosecutor stands to question him. "Is the defendant your direct supervisor?"

"Yes, sir."

"What's your opinion of him as a boss?"

"He's fair, sir. And he gets in there, in the work with us. Gets his hands dirty. Not like Ernesto. I mean, but Ernesto is getting on in years, so I understand."

"Do you socialize?" Marcus asks.

"Socialize, sir?"

"With the defendant. Go out for a drink with him? Play poker? Hang out?"

"Uh…no. Not really. We chat sometimes. In the fields or barns. Weather. How's the misses. How are your kids. Did you see that band at the tavern last weekend. That sort of thing."

"Do you feel you can evaluate this case without prejudice?"

"Yes, sir."

"I have no objection to his juror at this time," Marcus says, "but I may ask to revisit." He sits down.

The defense attorney, James, rises to ask his questions next. "Have you ever paid Candy Nilsson for sexual services?"

"I'm married, sir."

"That wasn't my question."

"I don't see what that has to do with anything," the potential juror replies.

Carol knows why the defense attorney is asking. He doesn't want men on the jury who have frequently paid Candy for sexual favors, because they might put themselves in Edgar's place and fear that they could be accused of rape even if they didn't commit it.

"Answer the question, juror," Judge Annette says coolly.

"Not since I've been married, no."

"Before you were married?" the defense asks.

The juror looks at the judge. "Do I have to answer that?"

"These proceedings are closed," the judge reminds him. "Any gossiping about what is heard here today will be met with a hefty fine."

The juror swallows. "Yes," he answers. "Sometimes. Before I was married."

"How long ago was that?" James asks.

"Over six years."

"How frequently did you avail yourself of those services?"

"Just Candy, or the whorehut in general?"

"Let's say the whorehut in general."

The juror shifts on his feet. "Two times a month, maybe."

"For a period of…"

"Uh…I don't really remember…since I got here until I started dating my wife. Ten months? A year maybe?"

"You said Gunther asks about your children?" the defense attorney asks.

"Yes, sir."

"Do you have a daughter?"

"Yes, sir."

"How old is she?"

"Four."

"I have no objection to this juror at this time," James says, "but I may wish to revisit."

"The juror may be seated," Annette announces, and the man quickly scrambles down into his seat. "Juror number three, please rise."

Dante stands, and after questioning, the prosecutor tries to dismiss him for being overfamiliar with the defendant, but the judge overrules, saying they do not appear to be close friends but mere acquaintances. "It's a small town," Annette reasons, "and Gunther is a councilman and the assistant farm manager. You're not going to find six people who don't have _any_ familiarity with him. Dante, you may be seated. Juror number four, please rise."

Trisha, the waitress, stands up. The prosecutor shakes his head. "You're friends with the defendant, aren't you?"

"Yes, sir."

"He helped you out of a jam awhile back, didn't he, by paying a fine of yours?"

Trisha looks around nervously. "That case file was supposed to be sealed."

"It _is_ a sealed file," Marcus says. "Outside of this court. Nothing said in this courtroom today can be repeated outside of this courtroom. Did he pay a fine of yours?"

Trisha nods. "Yes, sir."

"I suppose you feel indebted to him for that?"

"Yes, sir. I do."

"I move to dismiss this juror on grounds of overfamiliarity with the defendant and likely prejudice."

"Approved." Annette pounds her gavel. "You have three dismissals remaining, Marcus. You may go now, Trisha."

Trisha shoots Gunther a sympathetic smile as she exits her pew. She, too, pauses by Carol at the back of the chapel and says, "Keep us posted."

Carol can't keep them posted. She'll be held in contempt and fined. She says nothing as Trisha slips out the door of the chapel.

[*]

 _Kite-flying weather_ , Daryl thinks as he looks at the billowing sail. That's what his mama used to call a windy May day. She flew a kite with him once, when he was about six, before she started drinking more heavily and stopped noticing he was around. It was a sunny afternoon, and she laughed when the spool rolled out all at once and the wind took the kite high up into the sky. They ran together down the winding dirt mountain road, craning their necks back to watch the kite sail high into the sky, dip, and swerve until it finally plunged into a tree.

He needs to make Sweetheart a kite, he thinks.

"Poker?" Raul asks.

Daryl looks down from the sail. "Yeah. Sure." Sheriff Earl joins them around one of the barrels, and Raul deals him in. Daryl feels a little guilty, playing cards while Carol's no doubt stressing out over Gunther's trial.

Earl sweeps up his cards. "Captain McBride say is this wind keeps up, we could be at Oceanside before midnight."

"But Lieutenant Alvarado doesn't think it will," Raul tells him. "Still, we could be there by lunch tomorrow. A lot shorter trip than our last one."

"How long have you known Rosita?" Earl asks Daryl. "Since the start?"

They all mark time from the start of the apocalypse. They didn't exist before the world ended, not in the way they exist now. "Close," Daryl answers as he throws in his ante. "'Bout a year after."

"So for a lifetime, then?" Earl asks.

Daryl concedes with a snort.

"Anything I should know about her?"

"Wanna know somethin' 'bout 'er, then ask 'er. Not me."

"I mean…am I getting in over my head here?" Earl throws in his ante. "She's a little out of my league."

"Why's that?" Daryl asks.

Earl shrugs. "Because she's gorgeous. And talented. And a council woman."

"You're Sheriff," Raul tells him. "Of _Jamestown_."

"I am, aren't I?" he asks with a slight smile. He sighs. "I guess I'm just not looking to put my heart through the wringer again."

"'Sita ain't gonna cheat on ya," Daryl assures him. "She'll just tell ya right up when she tired of ya and wants to fuck someone else."

"Oh, well…" Earl rearranges his cards. "Such a relief."

[*]

"Juror number eight, please rise," Judge Annette says.

Commander Witherspoon stands, looking strangely nervous. Perhaps he wishes he had gone on that trip to Oceanside after all. "Commander James Witherspoon," he states for the record. "Naval officer and councilmember." The prosecutor asks about his relationship with Gunther, and he reports that Gunther is a "fellow council member."

"Do you socialize with him?" Marcus asks.

"We've had a drink together on occasion. Played a game of poker or two on the trade trip in November. I wouldn't say we're close friends. But my boyfriend Mitch is in his regular poker group."

"Any potential jealousy there?" the prosecutor asks.

"Jealousy?" Witherspoon replies in confusion.

"About this closeness between your boyfriend and the defendant?"

"Oh, no." Witherspoon laughs. "Not at all."

"Did you know the victim, Edgar?"

"Objection!" the defense attorney yells. "He can't use that term, _victim_. It's prejudicial."

"He's the victim in this case!" Marcus insists. "There wouldn't be a prosecution if we didn't have a _victim_."

"Please refer to Edgar as the deceased," Annette tells him.

Marcus shakes his head. "Fine, did you know the _deceased_?"

"I knew him," Witherspoon answers. "In passing. He was a fisherman, so he was sometimes on my ship. I spoke with him to issue commands, mostly, or to answer questions. We worked together in that sense. We weren't friends."

"I concede the floor to the defense," the prosecutor says.

The defense attorney rises. "Have you ever availed yourself of Candy Nillson's services?"

"He's a fag!" a man in the jury pool cries. "Of course not!"

Witherspoon clenches his fist, and Annette pounds her gavel. "One more word out of you when you are not being called upon, and I'll hold you in contempt. Understood?" The man looks down.

"Yes," Witherspoon answers, and there's some surprised murmuring among the potential jurors.

"Yes?" the defense attorney repeats.

"It was years ago," the commander answers with obvious embarrassment. "It was my twenty-first birthday. Captain John Smith insisted that I…uh…pop my cherry as he so delicately put it. It was his birthday gift to me. He and some of the other officers dragged me along to the whorehut. I went along with it. I didn't know what else to do. It was just the once. I never went back again."

"And you saw Candy?"

"I believe so."

"You _believe_ so?"

"My memory of the evening is spotty. I was very drunk at that point and there were…" Witherspoon looks at the floor. "There were three different women involved."

"At _once_?" the defense attorney asks.

Annette pounds her gavel, "Relevance, James?"

Witherspoon looks up to hear his own first name, but she's talking to the defense attorney, who is also named James.

"None," the attorney admits. "Forget the question. I have no further questions. I don't move to dismiss at this time."

The prosecutor rises. "I do. On grounds of overfamiliarity with the defendant. They work too closely together on the council."

"Approved. You may be dismissed." Annette pounds her gavel and the commander leaves the chapel, his head ducked in embarrassment as he passes Carol.

"Juror number nine," the judge calls, "please rise."

"Ensign Harry Merriweather," he states for the record. "Junior naval officer."

"Do you know the defendant?" the prosecutor asks.

"Just in passing. I mean, I know he's important."

"Important?" the prosecutor asks with a raised eyebrow.

"I mean, I know he's a councilman and the assistant farm manager, and we've probably spoken. In passing. We're not friends or anything."

"You're married?"

"Uh…I have a girlfriend. Kelly. We're getting married soon."

"She's pregnant, isn't she?"

"How do you know that?"

"It's a small town," the prosecutor replies.

"That's not _why_ we're getting married," Harry insists. "I mean, it's not the _only_ reason."

"But you expect to be a father soon. Perhaps of a daughter?"

"Yes. In about December. I don't know the sex of course," Harry says.

"Did you know the victim, Edgar?"

"Casually. He's a fisherman. I'm a sailor. So we worked together. I didn't really know him well. He kept to himself mostly."

"Do you think you can be impartial in this case?"

Harry nods, and the prosecutor hands the floor over to the defense. "Have you ever paid to secure Candy Nillson's services?" James asks.

"No."

"I remind you that you're under oath."

"No, sir, I have not."

"No further questions and no objection at this time."

Harry sits down. Carol notices two of the other potential male jurors shifting nervously in the pew.

"Juror number ten," Judge Annette announces, "please rise and state your name and occupation for the record."

A woman stands. "Erin Davenport. Gardener."

"The defendant, Gunther Hamilton, is your direct supervisor?" the prosecutor asks.

"No. The other assistant farm manager is."

"But he was your direct supervisor before a second assistant manager was appointed?"

"Yes."

"Do you socialize with him?"

"No. Not anymore. He took me on a couple of dates three years ago or so."

"Dates?" the prosecutor asks.

"Yes, sir. Once to the movies, and once to the tavern."

"Dates. With your _boss_. Interesting. Seems like an imbalance of power there."

"Objection!" the defense attorney shouts.

"Nix the moral commentary, Marcus," Judge Annette tells him.

"Did you have sexual relations with the defendant?" Marcus asks.

"No!" the woman exclaims. "I said he took me on two dates! I'm not _easy_."

"No offense intended," Marcus assures her. "What made you decide to stop dating him?"

"In the interest of honesty, on our second date, he told me he used to see some woman at the whorehut regularly, who had died. Megan I think was her name. Anyway, that was a no-go for me. I don't date whoremongers."

Gunther ducks his head and rubs his eyes.

The prosecutor cedes the floor to the defense attorney, who asks, "But you did like the defendant well enough to go out with him? Twice?"

"Sure. He _seemed_ nice enough, and he's not bad looking. I figured I'd give it a whirl. I didn't know he was a whoremonger."

"That's quite the word choice there," the defense attorney notes. " _Whoremonger_."

She shrugs. "Well, he was."

"So you probably don't think much of whores, either, I imagine?"

"Why should I?"

"If one were to get, say, slapped around, would you think she got what was coming to her?" James asks.

"Well, you can't work in that line of work and expect to meet truly wholesome men. Luckily, I found a good one finally. My husband Johnny _never_ went to that whorehut."

There's a snicker from another potential juror, and she turns and glares at him.

"I move to dismiss this juror on the grounds of potential prejudice against the defendant," James says.

"Approved." The judge pounds her gavel. "You may be dismissed."

The woman heads out of the court room.

The next juror to stand says, "Norma O'Neil. Seamstress and tailor." Carol recognizes her as the butcher's wife. She reports knowing Gunther as a friendly acquaintance to her husband, and hardly knowing Edgar at all. She's asked about her children, and reports she has none living, but she and her husband do sponsor a ten-year-old orphan girl. Neither attorney seeks to dismiss her.

Seaman Harrison stands next. "Any relation to the late traitor Commander Harold Harrison?" the prosecutor asks.

"No, sir. Absoltutely not. Just the same last name." Seaman Harrison reports knowing both Edgar and Gunther because he lived in the barracks with them until the dorm was built. "But I wasn't friends with either."

The defense attorney asks him, "Is it true that you were prohibited from any further trade trips to Oceanside because you offended an Oceanside woman by soliciting her for sex in exchange for ammunition?"

"Uh…yeah."

"Have you ever paid for Candy's services?"

"Uh…yeah."

"Recently? Within the last six weeks?"

"Uh…yeah."

"I move to dismiss this juror," he says. "On the grounds of overfamiliarity with the victim of the deceased."

"Objection!" the prosecutor insists. "Candy has not been proven to be a victim. If I can't use that word for _the deceased_ , you certainly can't - "

"- Sustained," Annette says, and pounds her gavel. "You'll refer to Candy by name, and not as the victim. And you can have your dismissal."

In the end, they end up with a jury of three women and three men. There's Norma, the butcher's wife; Karen, a married farmhand and the mother of an eleven-year-old boy; Cynthia, a former member of the Kingdom, the one with a teenage daughter; Ensign Harry Merriweather, the farmer Adam, and Dante.

"This court is adjourned," Judge Annette orders, "to allow the defense time to consult with the defendant and prepare his case. We will reconvene at nine a.m. tomorrow. The jury is under strict orders not to discuss the case and not to interact with the defendant until after the conclusion of the trial."

The chapel clears. Carol remains seated until the very end, when Deputy Andrew, who is doubling as a bailiff, walks Gunther out to the jailhouse. He's going to be kept in a jail cell until his trial is complete, to prevent any interaction with the jurors. He passes Carol, head bent, and she murmurs, "Hang in there."


	165. Chapter 165

Carol sets Gunther's dinner tray on the wooden table outside the jail cell. "I can eat out there?" he asks.

"Of course," she says as she swings open the iron door. She sits down at the little table across from him. She's already had dinner with Sweetheart.

Gunther picks up his spoon. "That selection process was embarrassing for all concerned."

Carol nods sympathetically.

" _Whoremonger_. I wonder how many people think of me that way?"

"Not me."

"Not Dianne, fortunately. I was afraid to tell her about Megan. I waited until almost the end of that trade fair. I thought she might be done with me after that. But she wasn't. Of course now…" He sighs. "She may be. I told her what I did to Edgar in the letter I sent with Daryl."

"I don't think this will be the end of it," Carol tells him. "I've never seen Dianne interested in a man before. Not in all the years I've known her."

"Really?"

Carol nods. "Of course, it was slim pickings in the Kingdom," she teases.

He smiles. "We're…different. Her and I. I'm too relaxed. She's not relaxed enough."

"Well, yin and yang. You could balance each other."

"Maybe. Of course, I'm not very relaxed at the moment." He takes a bite of the stew. "If I were to get banished, do you think Oceanside would take me in?"

"You're _not_ going to get banished. What would Jamestown do without you?"

"There's another assistant farm manager," he says. "And a farm manager."

"The other assistant isn't half as knowledgeable or half as hardworking as you. And Ernesto isn't going to be able to do the manager's job forever."

"I was a little peeved after the mutiny when Ernesto got the head position. He's just not a boots-on-the-ground type. But I have to admit, he's much more organized than I am. I'm improving, though. Dianne could teach me a thing or two about regulation."

Carol chuckles.

"You know…the thing I almost hate most about all this is not getting to visit her like I planned. Isn't that silly?"

"I don't think it's silly. You're in love."

He laughs. "What? I never said _that_."

"Mhm. No." Carol smiles. "You didn't have to."

Gunther changes the subject. He points to the stew with his spoon. "This is good, thank you. Almost as good as Linda makes it."

"Linda _did_ make it. It's a to-go bowl from the tavern." Carol wouldn't tell the ladies there anything other than that she thought Gunther had a reasonably fair jury.

"Ah. I guess it cooled a little on the way down. Better hotter."

Carol keeps him company until he's done eating, walks him to the outhouse and back, and then guides him back to the cell. She shuts the iron door. "I hate doing this," she admits as she clicks the key in the lock. "But the court's ordering it."

"It's not so bad," Gunther says, more to reassure her than himself, she thinks. "It's not too hot at night. This sleeping bag is comfy. The reading material's decent. How'd you know I like thrillers?"

"I saw the books on your shelf in your dorm room." She points to the oil lamp on his bench. "That goes out at nine p.m. Andrew will be by to take it and take you to the outhouse before bed if you need."

"Goodnight," he tells her.

She feels a pang of regret as she leaves him alone there, locked in his cell. When did she become _the man_?

[*]

Daryl stands bent over the rail of the ship, watching the blue-black water foam as the rays of the setting sun paint it like a canvas. He's bored. Bored out of his damn skull. Captain McBride put him to work for about three hours today, but that was it. There was the poker game and getting dinner from the mess hall to break the monotony. He doesn't really do much on his days off with Carol and the baby, either, but for some reason it's not _boring_ like this. Maybe because Sweetheart has become insatiably curious and always seems to be on the verge of exploring some new danger. But the evenings with Carol, after she's asleep, aren't boring either, even when they aren't screwing around.

"I'm bored." Raul leans against the rail next to him. "Want to play more poker?"

"Nah. Bored of poker."

"Chess? There's a chess set."

"Don't know how."

"I could teach you," Raul suggests. "You're never too old to learn."

"How'd you learn?"

"My dad taught me, of course. When I was six."

Santiago doesn't seem like the chess playing sort. It must be nice, Daryl thinks, to have a dad who teaches you chess when you're six, instead of teaching you to fetch his beer for him and to feed yourself because no one else is going to. At least if he screws up with Sweetheart, Daryl thinks, he'll never screw up as much as his own parents did. He slides away from the rail and follows Raul to one of the stools around a barrel, where the young man sets up a wooden chess set.

"Mind if I watch?" Carolyn asks as she pulls up a stool.

"You can play the winner," Raul tells her.

"So ya can play Raul," Daryl grunts.

Daryl listens to the rules and tries to file them away, but he forgets which piece can move which way how many spaces and gets a lot of, "You can't do that." He starts to get the hang of it halfway through, but he's lost too many pieces to have a likely win at this point. Still, he's trying. He's concentrating fiercely on the board when Carolyn asks, "So how long have you known Tara?"

"'S with all y'all on this trip?" First Earl, now Carolyn. "Feels like twenty questions."

"Just wondering. Since the start?"

"Nah. Close. 'Bout a year after." He and Carol are the only ones left from that first camp in the quarry near Atlanta. Michonne, Tara, Rosita, Eugene, Aaron – they're long-lived friends, longer-lived than anyone else he knows, but Carol's the only one left from that _first_ camp. It boggles his mind, suddenly, to think of it. Why _them_? Why were they the only two to survive? And is that why they're together, now? Because they made it? Was it inevitable?

"You're move," Raul says a little impatiently.

Daryl puts his hand on a knight. Someone has begun playing a fiddle on deck, and then another man joins in with a banjo. Two men start singing, and Carolyn wanders off to listen. "Check," Daryl says, and the _Susan Constant_ plows through the water at twelve knots toward the shores of Oceanside.

[*]

When Carol gets to the Barron cabin, Gary is riding his rocking horse with Sweetheart between his legs, crying, "Giddy up! Giddy up! Giddy up!"

"I'm going to have to teach him to ride a real horse soon, I suppose," Garland says. "And take him outside of the gates to learn to kill a walker."

"No!" Shannon insists. "Not _that_. Not _soon_."

"Daryl thinks I should have done it by now."

"He's four!" Shannon cries.

"Daryl said Judith was three and a half when she killed her first walker."

Carol laughs. "That's not true. She was at least six."

"Oh, good," Garland replies. "I thought that sounded a little exceptional, but I never know with your people."

"Jamestown _is_ my people," Carol tells him.

"It's good to hear that. Thinking of running for mayor?"

"What?" Carol asks in surprise. "No. Aren't you the one who thought I shouldn't run for council so soon?"

"Well, clearly I was mistaken about that, wasn't I?"

"Not entirely," Carol admits. "I lost. I'm only on the council because of the removal of Ana and the captain. I probably had fewer votes than Thomas."

"Oh, I doubt that," Shannon says. "Not that there's anything wrong with Thomas. Poor man. He got dumped by that Oceanside woman. Did you hear, baby?"

"Yes," Garland replies, "he mentioned it."

"Well why didn't you tell me then!" Shannon exclaims.

"Because I'm not a gossip." He turns his attention to his older son: "Not so hard, Gary! She's a very little girl."

"But Sweetie likes to go fast!" Gary insists.

Sweetheart slides off the horse and stumbles around a bit.

"See, you've discombobulated her," Garland says.

"Dis con – what?" Gary asks.

VanDaryl crawls over to the rocking horse and pulls himself up on Gary's leg. Gary drags him up on the horse and sets him in front of himself. "Hold on baby bwother!" he demands as he puts VanDaryl's little hands on the handles and covers them with his own. "Ready! Set! Go!"

VanDaryl laughs as Gary begins to rock.

"Well at least he's making some noise," Garland says. "He hasn't said a word yet. Not even mama."

"That's not that unusual," Carol assures him.

"Says the woman with the seventeen-month-old with a 60-word vocabulary," Garland mutters. It's more like forty words at this point, but Carol doesn't correct him. "He doesn't _babble_ either."

"Neither do you, baby," Shannon tells him. "We can't all be as verbose as I am."

"Well, that's for sure."

Shannon smacks him on the ass. "Behave." She goes to get Sweetheart's diaper bag and hands it to Carol. Sweetheart is now busying herself with a shape sorter on the deer skin rug. She's trying to get the star to go through the triangular shaped opening. "Go! Now!" she demands as she bangs it on the wooden square structure. "Go! Bad!"

"How was Gunther?" Garland asks.

"Hanging in there," Carol tells him. "He seems a little down. Naturally."

"I'll stop by in a bit," Garland says. "See if he wants to play some cards."

"What do you think the verdict's going to be in this case?" Carol asks him.

"I couldn't say. He _did_ kill the man."

"Oh, don't tell me you wouldn't kill a man if he raped some woman you cared about," Shannon tells him.

"Oh, I would," Garland assures her. "But I wouldn't have done it in public. And I wouldn't have gotten caught."

"The jury looks balanced," Carol tells him. "That's all I'm allowed to say. Three men, three women."

"Any parents of girls?" Garland asks.

"Yes."

"How many of the men went to the whorehut regularly?" he asks.

"You know I can't repeat what I heard in the courtroom."

"I'm the _mayor_. I could have been there, if I'd had time."

"But I'm _not_ the mayor," Shannon reminds him.

Garland nods. "Of course. At least the jury's balanced."

Carol goes over to the rug to pick up Sweetheart, who fusses to be deprived of her toy. "Thanks for watching her."

"Anytime," Shannon assures her. "Gary loves it when she's over. So does VanDaryl."

When they get back to the cabin, Dog is waiting patiently out front. He's been in the barns, on rat duty. When Carol opens the door, he goes straight to the hand-woven rug near the rocking chair in Sweetheart's room, circles twice, and takes up his guard dog position as Carol gets the toddler dressed for bed. It takes _four_ stories to get Sweetheart settled tonight, and Dog is out before the little girl is. Carol pulls the drapes around the slumbering pair.

She unclips all her weapons from her belt and goes to put them away in her footlocker. That's when she sees the envelope, on top of her arrows, with _To Carol_ scrawled on the front in Daryl's handwriting. Her lips twist into a grin and her heart patters unexpectedly, like that of a school girl who's just been passed a note from her secret crush.

She takes the envelope out of the foot locker and brings it to the living room, setting the oil lamp on the coffee table to provide a reading light. She tears open the envelope, unfolds the sheet of paper inside, and leans forward to read it by the glow of the lamp.

 _May 14, 9 NE_

 _Dear Carol,_

 _1._ _You're beautiful._ _2._ _You're a badass._ _3._ _I love you._ _4._ _Gonna miss you._

 _Hope four lines is enough for a love letter._

 _Love,_

 _Daryl_

Carol's burst of laughter wakes up Sweetheart, and she has to read her yet _another_ story before the little girl falls back to sleep.


	166. Chapter 166

Carol reads her letter from Daryl a second time over breakfast. "Your daddy's quite the romantic," she tells Sweetheart.

"Dada!" Sweetheart says as she dips her own small spoon in her oatmeal and slathers it on her face in an attempt to get it in her moth. "Dada bye bye."

"Dada will be home in a few days." Carol folds up the letter and takes over Sweetheart's feeding. Gunther's trial is about to being, and she needs to be there to testify. Carol gets the feeling it's going to be a long day.

[*]

Seagulls caw in the sky above. Daryl opens one eye where he lies on the deck of the _Susan Constant_ , using his bedroll as a pillow, and watches the birds dip and swerve. He didn't apply for a stint in a bunk below deck, since Carol's not with him, but he still managed to get five hours of sleep last night in this corner of the ship, without bothering about a blanket.

Bird poop plops from the sky onto his shirt. "Shit"! He rolls to his side, does a push-up, and then scrambles to his feet. "Goddamn sea rat with wings!"

Raul, who is passing by with a mop, stops, laughs, and leans on the handle. "Some alarm clock, huh?"

"How'd ya get stuck swabbin' decks?"

"I volunteered. Everyone has to help somehow, and I didn't want to be cooped up in the mess hall serving food. Breakfast is on, by the way."

Daryl flicks the bird poop off his shirt with a finger. "Gonna go get some."

"Might want to wash your hands first."

"How close are we to Oceanside?"

"An hour, the captain says. We made decent time last night. We should be there well before lunch."

[*]

Carol takes up a spot in the witnesses' pew. Gunther sits on a side pew on the altar stage, with his attorney and the attorney's apprentice next to him. The farmer looks almost like a different man to Carol. He's clean-shaven, and his thick, peppery black hair is neatly brushed. He wears tan khakis and a button-down, light blue shirt.

The court reporter turns to a clean page of her yellow legal pad and dips her quill in a small jar of ink. The bailiff, Deputy Andrew, stands in back of the courtroom chapel and announces, "All rise! The Honorable Judge Annette Howard presiding."

Annette enters from the small sacristy, wearing a black robe, takes a seat at the card table, and pounds her gavel, announcing, "This court is now in session. Bailiff, please read the charges to the jury."

Deputy Andrew takes a piece of paper from Annette and reads the charges off, after which the judge asks, "Defendant, how do you plead to the first charge of aggravated assault?"

Gunther stands. "I plead guilty, your honor."

"And how do you plead to the second charge of voluntary manslaughter?"

"I plead not guilty, your honor."

"Given that defendant has pled guilty to the first charge," the Judge instructs the jury, "Your task will be only to decide guilt or innocence on the second charge and an appropriate sentence. You will be advised of the minimum and maximum penalties required and allowed by law prior to sentencing. You also have the authority to convict the defendant of a lesser crime than the voluntary manslaughter with which he was charged, should you see fit."

The prosecutor begins with his opening remarks, insisting that he intends to prove that Gunther committed voluntary manslaughter "by forcibly breaking down the door of the deceased, pursuing him in flight, and attacking him with unnecessary and unusually violent force, with reckless disregard for the inevitable outcome. The defendant should have known that he held within his hands the strength, power, and ability to slay a man."

The defense attorney rises and says that he intends to show that Gunther's actions "do not rise to the level of voluntary manslaughter, but even if the jury should decide to convict of said charge, the sentence should be severely tempered, confined to the barest minimum required by law, because of the circumstances of the case. Gunther Hamilton did indeed attack Edgar Meadows in the heat of passion, but at extreme provocation. He stopped when instructed to do so by the authorities, and he cooperated with them. Edgar did not pass away until three days after the attack, and it cannot be proven that the attack was the direct cause of his death. Gunther is man of upstanding character and has made immense contributions to Jamestown as character witnesses will testify here today."

Carol glances down the witness pew and decides that's probably why Ernesto and Linda are here today. Candy's not present, no doubt because she doesn't want to re-live the events of that night. Some witnesses who saw Gunther beat Edgar outside of the dormitory are present, including Dwight. The fisherman who overheard noises from Edgar's room also sits in the witness pew. But it's Deputy Thomas who is called to the stand first. He relates being awoken by Gunther and tending to Candy at his request.

"So Gunther Hamilton," the prosecutor asks, "had the calm presence of mind to come and retrieve you to treat Candy Nilson before going to pay his violent call on Edgar?"

"Objection!" the defense attorney cries. "Speculation as to the state of the mind of the def – "

"- Sustained." The judge's gavel comes down on the card table.

"I'll rephrase," Marcus says. "Did Mr. Hamilton first come and get you to treat Ms. Nilson before going to Edgar's room?"

"Yes."

"And did he take the time to explain to you what had allegedly happened?"

"He just said Candy's been raped, she's been hurt, come help quickly."

"And he took the time to take you back to his room to treat her?"

"Yes."

"And only then did he depart, _several minutes_ after hearing Ms. Nilson's report of the alleged rape?"

"Well, I wouldn't say several minutes."

"How many minutes _would_ you say?" the prosecutor asks.

"I don't know. Getting me up and getting me over there…it all went so fast. I don't think it could have been more than three or four minutes."

"So he didn't depart until a _few_ minutes after Ms. Nilson's report of the alleged rape, then?" the prosecutor asks.

"I suppose."

"And at this time," the prosecutor asks, "was Ms. Nilson under any threat of severe bodily harm from Edgar?"

"Well…not by then," Thomas replies.

"So at the time Mr. Hamilton departed from Ms. Nilson's presence, a _few_ minutes after being informed of the alleged rape, and transported himself _all the way_ down the hallway to suite B, and busted down Edgar's door, and punched him in the face, and chased him into the parking lot, and beat him against the pavement – Ms. Nilson was at _no_ risk from Edgar Meadows _whatsoever_?"

Thomas grits his teeth. "No, sir," he answers honestly. "Not _then_."

"Did you hear any cries of help from Suite B during the course of the alleged rape?"

"No, but I was a- "

"- No further questions." The prosecutor returns to a side pew.

The defense attorney rises and walks to the chair where Thomas sits beside the judge's bench. "Did Gunther report to you that Candy told him she had been raped?"

"Yes."

Carol observes that the defense attorney is being more familiar by using their first names, no doubt to humanize Candy and Gunther to the jury.

"What did Gunther seem like when he told you this?"

"He was very upset. Angry. Overcome with emotion. Distraught."

"So you would _not_ say he had a calm presence of mind at all, would you?"

"Objection!" the prosecutor calls. "Speculation as to -"

"- Sustained!" The judge pounds her gavel.

"Was Candy naked when you entered Gunther's room?"

"Well, he'd wrapped her in a blanket. But, yes, under that she was naked."

"And was her clothing anywhere to be found?" the prosecutor asks.

"Not in Guntehr's room, no. Her clothes were in Edgar's room."

"So Candy was so distraught, that she ran naked from one suite to another to seek the assistance of her good friend?"

"Objection! Speculation as to the state of mind of – "

"- Sustained!" The judge pounds her gavel.

"You examined Candy and saw evidence of rape and violent assault?" the prosecutor asks.

"Yes, I did," Deputy Thomas answers.

"Can you describe that evidence?"

The jury shifts uncomfortably while Thomas describes the black eye, broken wrist, and bruising of the thighs, as well as Candy's weeping state. Beside Carol, Dwight tightly clenches one hand into a fist, and she wonders if he's thinking of the fact that he once allowed Sherry to subject herself to a kind of non-violent rape at the hands of Negan.

Thomas is dismissed from the stand. "I now call Deputy Councilwoman Carol Dixon to the stand," the prosecutor announces.

Carol stands, takes a breath, and prepares herself to be grilled by the prosecutor.

[*]

The seagulls sing to the gentle percussion of the waves that lap against the docked _Susan Constant_ as the boots of the departing crew and passengers drum across the dock. Daryl swings his pack on his back and makes his way down the ramp beside Raul, who is rolling his motorcycle.

Several women are waiting alongside the dock and shore. Rosita hooks a finger through Earl's beltloop and draws him close for a kiss, which leaves a grin plastered across his face. Rosita saunters off in front of him, sashaying her hips, and he follows, trying not to stare too obviously at her ass.

Captain McBride comes to a sudden stop before Cynde, his boots skidding on the dock. "Hello, there," he says.

Cyndie smirks. "Hello."

"Should I stay on the ship tonight?"

"Well," she says, "since Oceanside only has to put up a handful of traders and no fairgoers, I've got space for you in my cabin if you'd like to stay there."

"I would _very much_ like to stay there," he says with a smile.

Cyndie sweeps his captain's hat off his head and sets in on her own. "Well, come on then."

Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado pauses as Cyndie and the captain walk off together. He looks around, face fallen, until he spies Michonne on the shore. He waves, and she waves back, which he takes as invitation enough to jog over to her. Michonne's come, along with Rosita, to represent Alexandria in the trades, which, Daryl hopes, means he'll get to see Judith and RJ before he heads with Raul to the Hilltop. Michonne turns her cheek to the lieutenant, allowing him a single kiss before they stroll toward the camp. That man's not going to last long, Daryl thinks.

Tara, who has apparently come to trade for the Hilltop, greets Carolyn, who seems surprised to find her on the docks. Daryl is, too, after Tara said she wasn't interested in the woman. "Dianne said she'd put us up in her cabin," Tara tells Carolyn. "Two spare rooms. So I just thought I'd show you where that is."

"Well, I appreciate that," Carolyn tells her.

"I've just got to hug this guy first." Tara walks around Carolyn to throw her arms around Daryl, who gives her a big hug back. "Where's Carol?" Tara asks as she pulls away.

Daryl sighs. "Had some serious deputy's business back in Jamestown. Couldn't make it. Be here for the trade fair in November, though. 'N were gonna bring Sweetheart then."

"Good. I've got to see this little Dixon vixen."

Daryl rolls his eyes. They better not start calling Sweetheart that. Raul has walked ahead of Daryl by now, pushing the motorcycle across the shore, and the dock has cleared off of people. Men are filtering across the beach toward the trees and cabins. But Dianne remains on the dock when Tara and Carolyn leave. She stares at the empty ship. "Where's Gunther?"

Daryl shifts his pack on his shoulder. "He uh…" He doesn't know how much Gunther has said in his letter to Dianne about what happened, and he doesn't want to be the one to decide how much she knows. "He couldn't make it. But I got a letter for ya from 'em." He drops his pack onto the dock and unclips the back pouch to draw out the bundle of letters.

"A _letter_?" she asks.

"Mhmm." Daryl eases Gunther's out of the bundle and hands it to her.

"A letter?" she takes it with a mixed look of anger, disappointment, and fear. "He promised he'd be here."

"Yeah, like I said…somethin' came up."

"Something or _someone_?" she asks with a strange twinge of emotion in her voice. The woman's always struck Daryl as a little aloof, and it surprises him, that hint of vulnerability.

"Just read it. 'M sure he'll 'splain in there."

Dianne nods and taps the letter against her open palm. "How's the queen?"

"The _councilwoman_ ," Daryl corrects her. "'N she's…she's a'right. Got ya a letter from 'er, too." He flips through the stack again and pulls out Carol's letter to Dianne. After Dianne takes it he says, "Gotta deliver the rest of these." He walks past her, leaving her alone on the dock, where she anxiously tears open the letter from Gunther.


	167. Chapter 167

"When you arrived on the scene, were you responding to cries of help from Edgar?" the prosecutor asks Carol.

"Yes," Carol says simply. She has to be honest, but she doesn't have to be detailed.

"Did you hear Raul Dominguez shout, _Stop, Gunther, you'll kill him_!"

"Yes."

"Did you see the defendant, Mr. Hamilton, banging Edgar's head against the pavement of the museum parking lot?"

Carol's annoyed that the prosecutor is familiarly calling the rapist _Edgar_ and her accused friend _Mr. Hamilton_ , but of course she knows why he's doing it. "Yes."

"Was there blood on the pavement?"

"Yes."

The prosecutor walks away from her to address the jury more directly. "The defense attorney, in his opening remarks, claims that Mr. Hamilton cooperated fully with the authorities and that he ceased his attack when instructed to do so." He strolls back toward Carol. "When you told Mr. Hamilton to stop attacking Edgar, did he immediately do so?"

"Not immediately, but he stop – "

"- Yes or no will suffice. Did he immediately cease attacking Edgar?"

"No."

"No," the prosecutor repeats. "And in fact you had to physically stop the attack, did you not?"

"Yes."

"And were you able to stop the attack on your first attempt?"

"Well, there's a size difference between me and–"

"Yes or no? On your _first_ attempt, were you able to stop the attack?"

"No."

"No," the prosecutor repeats. "In fact, Mr. Hamilton threw you off and _continued_ his attack, did he not?"

"Yes."

"And you had to enlist the help of Raul Dominguez to drag Mr. Hamilton off Edgar. That is how severely he was beating the man and how determined he was to cause injury to –"

"- Objection!" the defense attorney springs to his feet. "Prejudicial commentary."

"Sustained." Annette pounds her gavel. "No editorializing, Marcus."

"Did you have to call on Raul Dominguez to assist you in ending the attack?"

"Yes. But Gunther didn't attempt to re – "

"Yes. will suffice. Deputy Dixon, other than the fisherman Shawn Maxwell, did _anyone_ in _all_ of Suite B report hearing any unusual sounds from Edgar's room that night?"

"Well, no," Carol replies, "but several of the – "

"- No further questions." The prosecutor sits down in one of the side pews typically reserved for ministers and acolytes.

The defense attorney rises and walks over to Carol. "Did Gunther resist arrest once the attack had stopped?"

"No," Carol answers.

"Did he cooperate with the Sheriff's Department upon his arrest?"

"Yes," Carol insists. "He was entirely compliant and cooperative and has been in the course of our entire investigation as well as while being detained for trial."

"In the course of your investigation following the attack, did you find evidence that Candy had been raped?"

"Yes." Carol describes the room, the signs of an attack, the torn undergarments, and the sounds the fisherman reported overhearing. "All this in addition to the injuries that Deputy Thomas had already catalogued for the jury."

"Did the Sherriff's Department make an arrest of Edgar Meadows and charge him with aggravated felony assault and rape in the first degree?"

"Yes, it did, and we held him under guard in the infirmary."

"Did you make an arrest of Edgar Meadows several months ago involving indecency?"

"Yes. He was caught watching women bathe in the river from his hiding place behind the bushes. He was masturbating at the time of his apprehension."

There some surprised whispering in the jury box, women wondering, perhaps, if they were in the river that day, and men wondering if their wives or girlfriends were.

"And was he convicted on this charge?" James asks.

"He plead guilty and took a plea bargain and paid a fine."

"So he admitted to this lewd behavior, to lasciviously and secretly preying on the unsuspecting wives and mothers and daugh – "

"-Objection!" the prosecutor cries.

"Sustained," the judge agrees.

"No further questions."

The fisherman Shawn is called to the stand next, and the defense asks him what he heard coming from Edgar's room. "I heard Candy shouting no."

"How many times?"

"I don't know…" He says nervously. "A couple?"

"Did you hear the sound of a dresser being slammed against a wall?"

"Maybe. I heard some kind of loud bang. That could have been it."

"Did you hear Candy screaming?"

"Yeah. I mean, I heard like an Ugh. You know a real loud Ugh. And an Aaah scream, kind of. And some other kind of nondescript cry." The fisherman looks sick to his stomach. "But I didn't know for – "

"- No further questions."

The prosecutor rises to cross examine. "If you thought Ms. Nilson was being raped, why didn't you do anything about it?"

"I…I didn't _know_ she was being raped."

"And why didn't you think so?" Marcus asks.

"Well, because guys pay her sometimes to, you know…fool around. And Edgar said he was paying her to come over that night. So I knew they'd be fooling around. And I thought she was just…you know, role playing for him. That he wanted her to pretend, you know, that it was rough?"

"Have _you_ paid her to fool around?"

The fisherman's flushes. "Yes, sir."

"And what have you paid her to do, precisely?"

He looks nervously at the judge. "Do I have to say that?"

"Be more specific in your questions, Marcus, or abandon this line of inquiry," Annette says.

"Have you paid Ms. Nilson to do a strip tease for you?"

"Yes."

"So it's not at all unusual that Deputy Dixon should have found her clothes in a pool on Edgar's floor?"

"Objection!" James rises. "He's asking the witness to speculate on -"

"- Sustained," the judge rules.

"Have you paid Ms. Nilson to allow you to fondle her?"

"Yes."

"To give you handjobs?"

"Yes." The fisherman's face gets redder with each passing question.

"Fellatio?"

"What?" the fisherman asks.

"Blowjobs."

"No, I can't afford that."

"Can't afford it?" the prosecutor asks. "But Ms. Nilson does offer that service?"

"Well, if you've got enough liquor or ammo or tobacco."

"So Ms. Nilson doesn't _normally_ offer that service, but pay her enough, and she may offer _any_ service? Even rough role play in-"

"-Objection!" James shouts.

"Sustained." The judge pounds her gavel. "Tread lightly, counselor."

"I have no further questions for this witness."

"Permission to redirect?" James asks. Annette nods, and the defense attorney approaches the stand. "To your knowledge, is one of the services Candy offers penetrative sex?"

"No," The fisherman answers. "She doesn't do that. Not since the condoms all expired anyway."

"So not for several years."

"No. Everyone knows that."

"So if the evidence indicates that penetration took place with Edgar, that would be very unusual wouldn't it?"

"Objection! Speculation. Leading the witness," Marcus calls.

"Sustained."

"Let me ask you this, then. Have you ever paid Candy to role play as if she was being raped?"

"No!" the fisherman cries. "Absolutely not. I don't get off on that. I'm not a perv!"

"To your knowledge, has anyone else ever paid her to role play as if she was being raped?"

"No."

"To your knowledge, is that a service she offers?"

"No."

"Thank you. No further questions."

Carol's glad Candy didn't come to testify on Gunther's behalf. This would be a terrible trial for her to suffer through. Instead of asking her to testify, the defense submits as evidence Candy's deposition, which is read aloud to the jury and then submitted to the foreman in a file for later review. The defense attorney then calls Dr. Emily Olson to the stand. "Did Edgar die within the first twenty-four hours after Gunther attacked him?"

"No."

"The next day?"

"No."

"So in fact, he passed away a considerable amount of time after the attack?"

"Yes."

"What was the _immediate_ cause of death?"

"The immediate cause of death was a lack of oxygen to the brain that occurred after he slipped into a coma," the doctor answers.

"If you had had access to an oxygen tank, doctor, as hospitals once did, would he have died in that moment?"

"No."

"So he might have gone on to live and recover fully from his coma?"

"Objection," the prosecutor calls almost languidly. "Speculation."

"I'll allow it," Annette tells him. "The doctor's professional opinion is worthy of note."

"Yes, he may very well have," Dr. Emily replies.

"No further questions."

The prosecutor cross-examines the witness: "When you examined Edgar, what did you find?"

Emily describes his contusions, blood loss, bruises, and state of slipping in and out of consciousness.

"Did he eventually slip into a coma?"

"Yes."

"In your opinion, was his coma caused by the blows he received at the hands of Mr. Gunther Hamilton?"

Emily glances sympathetically toward Gunther and then back at the prosecutor. "Yes."

"And while in that coma, did Edgar in fact die?"

"Yes."

"No further questions."

When Emily is dismissed, the prosecutor calls Gunther to the stand, but his attorney rises and says, "My client invokes his right not to self-incriminate. He will not be taking the stand today."

The prosecutor shrugs and calls Dwight to the stand instead. "Did you witness the defendant pounding Edgar's head into the pavement?"

"Yes," Dwight replies.

"Did you see blood pooling beneath his head?"

"Yes."

"Did you hear Raul call to the defendant to stop, or he might kill the man?"

"Yes."

"Did he stop?"

"No. Not then."

"It was a shocking scene to witness, wasn't it?" Marcus asks. "Have you ever seen a man's head so brutally beaten?" The prosecutor swirls toward the jury, as though his question is almost rhetorical, but Dwight answers, "I've seen much worse."

The prosecutor freezes.

Every muscle in Carol's body tenses as she thinks of Glenn. If she'd been there to witness that scene, like Daryl was, she might have to walk out of this courtroom right now. Old resentments against the Saviors rise up in her, and she tries to push them down. Dwight is a citizen of Jamestown now, and it won't do her any good to hold a grudge against him, but it's hard not thinking of the friends she's lost. So she tries, instead, to think of the friends that Dwight, perhaps, helped them to save. If Dwight hadn't given Daryl information, they might not have won that war.

"No further questions," the prosecutor mutters, clearly unprepared for the response.

The defense attorney approaches. "Once pulled off of Mr. Meadows, did Gunther appear to cooperate with the deputies?"

"Yes, very much so," Dwight answers.

"Have you had any personal interaction with Edgar Meadows?"

"Yes."

"And how would you describe that interaction?"

"Not friendly," Dwight answers. "I found him lingering outside of the outhouse when my wife Sherry was in there."

"Lingering?" the defense asks. "Lingering how?"

"I think was trying to look through the moon. You know, the one carved in the door."

"And what was your reaction to this?"

"I was angry," Dwight replies. "I threw him against the side of the dormitory, and I told him if I ever caught him doing that again…" Dwight scratches his deformed cheek. "I said he'd be very sorry."

"And did you report this occurrence to the Sheriff's Department?"

"It was already evening. I didn't realize he had a history of peeping before that, or that he had invited Candy over, or I might have been more on guard. But my wife and I were getting ready for bed. She's been tired. She's pregnant. I thought I'd report it in the morning. But then everything happened. Edgar raped Candy, and – "

"- Objection!" the prosecutor cries. "Speculation."

The defense attorney holds up a hand. "Thank you, Dwight. No further questions."

The prosecutor calls a second witness who was outside of the dorm, who states similar facts, and the defense does not cross examine him. Instead, James says, "I'd like to call my first character witness, Ernesto Martinez, to the stand."

Ernesto is sworn in.

"How long have you known the defendant?" James asks.

"Oh, over eight years now. I arrived at Jamestown five months after the Great Sickness erupted. He arrived about two months later."

"He's your employee, is he not?"

"Yes. He's been one of my assistant managers for two years now. Before that, we were co-workers and both assistant managers under the old farm manager."

"Would you say he's a reliable worker?"

"Yes," Ernesto replies.

"A fair boss to his employees?"

"Indeed."

"Patient in his dealings?" James asks.

"Patient when the job requires him to be. Sometimes it requires him to be insistent. We do have to manage people after, all."

"Has he ever abused any of the farm hands, raised a hand to one, or otherwise dealt harshly with one?"

"No. He's a mild man, usually."

"Has he been known to put in extra hours when farm hands have been injured or ill, and unable to work, without asking for extra rations for himself, but instead allowing those rations to go to them?"

"Yes. He's done that from time to time. He looks out for his people."

"In the over eight years that you have known Gunther Hamilton, have you ever seen him attack another man?"

"No. I have not."

"Thank you. No further questions."

"No questions," the prosecutor calls.

When Ernesto is seated back in the witness pew, Linda squeezes his hand and says, "Good job."

The prosecutor stands. "I call Linda Wexler to the stand."

Linda shoots Ernesto a confused look. Carol's confused, too. She thought Linda was the _defense's_ witness, a _character_ witness. Why is the _prosecution_ calling her?

Linda slides past the legs of Ernesto, Dwight, Thomas, and Carol and into the aisle of chapel. Nervously, she takes the stand.

[*]

Daryl catches up with Michonne on the edge of the camp, before the sandy shore disappears into the dirt. Lieutenant Alvarado is still beside her, but the kids have joined her now, too. Judith comes running toward him, shouting, "Uncle Daryl!" He picks her up and twirls her around in a great big bear hug before setting her on her feet. Then he affectionately rubs the top of RJ's head. The boy jerks his head away, but with a grin.

"What'd you bring me?" Judith asks.

"Judith!" Michonne scolds.

"Nah. 'S a'ight. Course I got the kids somethin'." Daryl squats down, opens his backpack, and pulls out a small bag of fresh cherries. He shakes it. "Y'all don't got these in Alexandria, do ya?"

Judith gasps and grabs the bag and begins to count the cherries.

"Mine too!" RJ cries. "They're for me, too!"

"Share them," Michonne cautions Judith. "Equally. And let me have one."

"Then they won't be equal," Judith insists. "There's fourteen. How are we supposed to share equally if I give you one?"

"Fine," Michonne tells her in that indulgent tone of hers, the one she uses just before she slams down on someone. "Then give me _two_."

Judith glowers.

Michonne holds out her hand. Judith sighs, opens the bag, and sets two cherries in her mother's open palm. Then she looks up at Lieutenant Alvarado. "I don't have to give _him_ any, do I?"

The lieutenant, who is about thirty and has warm brown eyes, dark brown hair, a pencil mustache, and the faintest hint of brown skin, raises both hands in mock defense. "Hey, not me. There are plenty where I come from."

"Are you my mom's friend?" Judith asks with a tilt of her head, the cherry bag in one hand, and the other hand on her hip.

The lieutenant smiles hesitantly and drops his hands. "I believe so…" He glances at Michonne. "Yes?"

Michonne smiles.

"You can call me Carlos," he tells Judith.

" _Lieutenant_ Carlos," Michonne insists.

"How do you even know Mommy?" RJ asks.

"Well, she visited Jamestown last month," Carlos replies, "and we got to know one another."

"How?" RJ asks. "Did you play games?"

Michonne snorts. "Yes. We played games."

Lt. Carlos Alvarado smiles at the sandy ground.

"Is he a friend like Daryl is," Judith asks, "or a friend like _Darius_ was?"

"Well, no one's a friend like Daryl is." Michonne gives Daryl an affectionate punch on the shoulder. "But Lt. Carlos might hang out with us for the next couple of days, if that's oaky with _you_."

Judith shrugs. "As long as Daryl hangs out with us, too."

"Uh…actually, I gotta take Raul to the Hilltop."

Judith glowers beneath Rick's old deputy's hat.

"Hey, but 'fore we go," Daryl promises, "I'll play with y'all for awhile. 'N have lunch with ya." He glances toward Raul, who is in a clearing by the cabins, squatting down and running a clean rag over the motorcycle to shine it up. A young Oceanside woman is trying to flirt with him while he does it, but he's oblivious to anything but getting that bike ready to ride to see Enid. He cups a hand around his mouth and calls. "Raul! Leavin' after lunch!"

"After?" Raul calls back. "But I thought – "

"- We made good time!" They arrived at Oceanside twelve hours earlier than they expected. "Got time."

Raul slaps his rag on the seat of the motorcycle in defeat, mutters something to the ground, and walks off somewhere, maybe to hang out with people he befriended last time he was here.

"C'mon, Little Ass Kicker," Daryl says, walking backward a few steps. "You, too, mini-Rick." He turns on his heels and the kids march after him.

Behind him, he can hear the lieutenant ask Michonne, "Little ass kicker?"


	168. Chapter 168

The prosecutor faces the folding chair on the altar stage as Linda smooths a wrinkle in the ankle-length, floral spring dress she's elected to wear for court. "How long have you known the defendant, Mr. Hamilton?"

"Over eight years," Linda replies. "He arrived at Jamestown a few months after I did."

"You manage the tavern, don't you?" the prosecutor asks.

"Yes, I do."

"And you used to manage the whorehut?"

"Yes," Linda answers warily.

"Was Mr. Hamilton once a regular customer at that whorehut?"

"Well, I – "

"-Objection! Relevance!" the defense cries.

"You've brought in character witnesses," the prosecutor reasons. "I have a right to rebut."

"Sustained," the judge rules.

"Was Mr. Hamilton once a regular customer at the whorehut?"

Linda sits up straighter in the chair. "I _suppose_ you could call him that."

"For a year, he visited the whorehut on a weekly basis, did he not?"

"I don't have those books anymore. I couldn't tell you."

"But he _did_ visit?" the prosecutor asks. "Regularly? You can confirm that much?"

"Yes," Linda admits.

Gunther has tried to hide his face by leaning forward, but his attorney has urged him to sit up, so now he just stares straight forward off into a corner of the chapel.

"So the defendant is intimately acquainted with Ms. Candy Nilson?" the prosecutor asks.

"If by intimately you mean carnally, _no_ ," Linda replies.

The prosecutor blinks. Carol doesn't know where he was going with this, but he's clearly been set back. "He didn't secure Ms. Nilson's services?"

"No. He only _ever_ saw Megan O'Connor. She was the only one he visited. He cared for her. He asked her to marry him, eventually, but she was…well, she was too far gone into the bottle."

The prosecutor shifts his line of inquiry. "But he paid for sex on a weekly basis at the whorehut?"

"As I said, I don't have the books anymore. I can't tell you how often he was there or what he might have paid for, and I won't speculate under oath."

"But he did see Ms. Megan O'Connor, when she was alive?"

"Yes."

"He had a fondness for her?"

"Yes."

"Like he has a fondness for Ms. Nilson?"

"Not in the _same_ way, no. Candy's like a little sister to him. But, yes, he's fond of Candy. If that's what you're asking."

"He's protective of the women he's fond of?" the prosecutor asks.

"I'd say so. Yes. There's nothing wrong with that," Linda answers.

"Possessive, perhaps?"

"No," Linda replies decidedly. "Gunther's not the possessive type."

"Four years ago, did you witness an altercation outside the whorehut between Mr. Hamilton and Commander Harold Harrison?"

Linda grips the side of the folding chair in which she sits. "Yes," she answers cautiously.

"When Commander Harrison insulted Ms. Megan O'Connor, of whom Mr. Hamilton was, in your own words, _fond_ , just as he's _fond_ of Ms. Nilson – did Mr. Hamilton respond by punching him in the face?"

"You have to understand the context. The commander was being a complete and total ass - "

"- Yes or no? Did he punch the commander in the face?"

"Well, yes."

"Twice?"

"Yes."

"And did the commander drop to the ground with the second blow?"

"Yes," Linda answers.

"Two hits, and he was out?"

"For a minute or two. He got up. He was fine."

"Two hits." The prosecutor holds up two fingers toward the jury, "and the defendant was able to knock out a man as big as Commander Harold Harrison, a man _much_ bigger than Edgar." The prosecutor turns again to Linda. "Has Mr. Hamilton ever mentioned to you his days as an amateur boxer?"

"In passing."

"He boxed in amateur competitions from the age of eighteen to the age of twenty-six, didn't he?"

"I couldn't tell you the exact age."

"But he has mentioned it was a hobby of his in his younger years?" the prosecutor asks.

"Yes."

"Did Commander Harrison press charges against Mr. Hamilton when he was hit?"

"I think so."

"I know so." The prosecutor strolls toward the jury pew. "Commander Harrison pressed assault charges, and Mr. Hamilton plead guilty and settled out of court for a fine. His former assault conviction is a matter of court record and will be submitted to the jury for review. This is his second," the prosecutor holds up two fingers, "assault charge. The _second_ time he has beaten a man to – in his mind - protect the honor of a woman." The prosecutor turns back to Linda: "Now let me ask you this. Is Mr. Hamilton a regular customer at your tavern?"

"Yes," Linda answers.

"How many times a week would you say he comes in?"

"I don't know," Linda answer peevishly. "Five maybe."

"Five! Five nights a week at the bar! He's quite the drinker is, he then?" the prosecutor asks.

"No," Linda replies triumphantly, sitting a little straighter, "he doesn't drink any alcohol at all anymore. Or at least extremely rarely. He may have had one drink to calm his nerves over this whole absurd affair. But it's been a while since he drank regularly. He comes for dinner. Sometimes lunch. An iced tea. A coffee."

"But he _used_ to drink regularly?" the prosecutor asks.

"All of us used to do a lot of things," Linda replies. "We've all done what we had to do in order to survive. We've all lost homes and loved ones and dignity and a little bit of our humanity. We've all seen terrible things, _done_ terrible things. And sometimes you just need a drink. A drink and a tavern keeper to talk to. I don't begrudge any man his liquor, but I'm glad Gunther stopped drinking, for his own health. Because he's a _good_ man, and I don't want to see him leave this world too early. He's honorable and hardworking and even when he _was_ drinking regularly, he behaved as a gentlemen toward women, and he - "

"- No further questions," the prosecutor interrupts.

The defense attorney stand. "Permission to cross examine?"

"Granted."

The defense attorney seizes the opportunity to turn Linda into a positive character witnesses, which she is more than ready to be. When she later sits down in the witness pew next to Ernesto, she sighs warily. He puts a hand on her knee and squeezes.

[*]

For a while, Daryl doesn't worry about Carol or Sweetheart or Gunther's trial. He plays uncle, and he enjoys it, too, because he gets to hand the riled-up kids right back to Michonne in the end. Then he goes to give Henry his letters from Carol and Linda.

"Mom told you to give me a hug from her, too, didn't she?" Henry asks.

"Mhmhm," he murmurs.

"Don't worry. I won't make you. But you have to come see how my pub's coming along. The grand opening is planned for July. _If_ I get enough investment."

Henry shows Daryl the mess hall he's been renovating to turn into a pub. All of Oceanside's storage items have been hauled to one end, more carefully organized, and hidden behind a drape. Folding tables and chairs have been set up, and at one end he's built a long bar with stools. There's a piano in the corner, and some bongo drums. The walls of the place are decorated with fish nets, rusty fishing spears, and painted seashells. It's a bit chintzy, but rustic. Nothing pretentious. "That was all Rachel," Henry says, waving at the décor. "I'm thinking of asking her to become my full partner. I want her to run this place with me. She'd have to scale back on one of her jobs, though, either the fishing or all the advisory meetings. But I could use her help."

"Don't shit where you eat, kid."

"What?"

"I ain't no Dr. Phil, but I know that much."

"What much?" Henry asks. "What does that mean? And who is Dr. Phil?"

Daryl leans back against the bar, between two stools, and crosses his arms over his chest. "Means it ain't a good idea, workin' that close with yer wife."

"You've worked with my mom."

"Not like that."

"You ruled the Kingdom together for almost a year," Henry insists.

"Nah. Mostly left that to 'er. Gave advice sometimes, when it was somethin' I really thought I had to say. Kept my mouth shut otherwise."

"You were both on the prison council together, she said."

"Weren't married then. 'N that wasn't a _job_. Back then…things were different. Weren't no politicians. Weren't no _rules_. Just had to decide shit sometimes, so ya met and decided it. I didn't run for the Jamestown council, and I ain't gonna. 'N she don't come tell me how to hunt neither."

Henry leans back beside him and similarly crosses his arms over his chest. "But I could really use Rachel's help."

"That what she wants?"

Henry shrugs. "She liked decorating the place."

"Yeah, well, chicks like decoratin' shit. Don't mean she wants to give up anything she's doin' 'n work with you all the damn time. Think 'bout it. All the time. At home, _and_ at work. All. The. Time."

"We could get on each other's nerves," Henry admits. "But I'm not like you."

"Hell's that mean?"

"I'm not like, you know…an outdoor cat."

"Fuck's that mean?"

"You know!" Henry pushes off the bar. "You need your space. Not _just_ from my mom, but from… _people_. In general. I don't. Neither does Rachel."

"Ar'ight, kid, suit yerself. Don't say I didn't warn ya." He stands straight, steps forward, and looks around. "So Cyndie gave ya the green light?"

"Yeah, but I have to pay for the liquor up front. So I'm still drumming up investments." He smiles. "Do you want to invest by any chance?"

"Invest what?"

"Ammo. Cyndie will let me trade ammo for the booze. And I'll accept ammo and tobacco and other things in payment for tabs like Linda does. Once I've made enough profit, I'll pay you back your investment, plus five percent. What do you say?"

"I ain't never lent money, and I ain't gonna start now."

"Ten percent?"

"Hell I just say? I don't _lend_ money."

Henry sighs. "Well, I had to _try_. I thought you might be willing to help. But I understand. It's not like I'm _your_ son. And it probably seems too ambitious. You think I'm going to fail, don't you?"

"Didn't say I wasn't willin' to help. But I don't lend out shit I 'spect to get back. 'Cause that shit ain't never come back where I grew up. But I'll _give_ ya some ammo." Daryl digs in the pocket of his cargo pants and pulls out a loose handgun magazine loaded with twelve rounds, and then four more loose rounds. "Found this scavengin' last week." He was going to trade it to the Hilltop for a little bit of ethanol, but he has enough fuel to get there and back to Oceanside, and he can always make more. "Keep the magazine, too. Already got four for my nine mil'."

"Wow! Thanks!" Henry takes the magazine with wide eyes and slips the loose bullets in his pants pocket. "You don't want me to pay you back?"

"I get a free drink first time I come in, yeah?"

"Yeah. Yeah, sure," Henry agrees with a grin. "The first two times!"

[*]

After a few more witnesses, the trial draws to a close, and the prosecutor walks solemnly toward the jury's pew to make his final statement. "On the night in which he attacked Edgar Meadows, Gunther Hamilton was not acting in self-defense. He had to walk all the way to Edgar's room in another suite, break down his door, and chase him into the parking lot in order to administer his blows. Nor was he acting in defense of Ms. Nilson. At the moment of the attack, she was already safely and securely under the guard of Deputy Thomas in another room in another suite. The only person who was, at that moment, at risk of severe bodily harm, was Edgar Meadows himself."

The prosecutor takes a step forward. "Mr. Hamilton is not ignorant of his own strength. He's a trained boxer, who can knock a sizable man unconscious with two carefully planted blows. And he knows he can, because he once _did_. He did so four years ago in response to an insult to a woman he cared about. And when a close friend of his a few nights ago suffered what he believed to be a far worse insult, Mr. Hamilton responded by busting down Edgar Meadows' door, hitting him, chasing him out of his room, and following him through his suite and into the parking lot, where he wrestled him to the ground. There, he pounded that man's head _repeatedly_ against the hard pavement until blood pooled beneath it. He did not stop beating that man's head into the ground until he was forcibly pulled off him by an officer of the law _and_ another citizen. As a direct consequence of the defendant's actions, as the doctor has testified here today, that man slipped into a coma. And then that man died."

The prosecutor walks over to his side pew and opens a file folder. "In this folder is a copy of the pertinent law of Jamestown. I want you to have that definition at your disposal as you deliberate. I want you to have it, because what this case comes down to is a matter of pure legal definition." He shuts the folder. "Don't be scared off by a word like _voluntary_. No one here is saying Mr. Hamilton premeditated his crime, that he plotted to kill Edgar. What the prosecution _is_ saying is that, in the heat of passion, Mr. Hamilton willfully killed a person he had _no prior intent_ of killing. A reasonable person, especially one with Mr. Hamilton's boxing background, would have known that death was a likely outcome of his actions. Voluntary manslaughter is a crime of passion, and that's what Mr. Hamilton committed – a crime of _passion_. I think as you review this definition in your deliberations, you will see that Mr. Hamilton's actions fit the description perfectly. I don't think any of you will, in good conscience, be able to deny that."

The prosecutor looks at the floor of the stage for a moment and then looks up at the jury again. "I know Mr. Hamilton is well liked. And I know Edgar was not. But Jamestown is above all a community of laws. We are a people of the law. It's what sets us apart from the world out there." He points through the stained glass of one of the chapel's windows. "It's what sets us apart from the vicious raiders we have had to fight back, from the bandits, from the pirates, from the brutal, lawless camps so many of us escaped before we had the good fortune to become full citizens of this unique, safe, and ordered community. We're all grateful for this community, I'm sure. And what sustains this community is justice. What sustains this community is law. _Not_ vigilantism. Not men becoming judge, jury, and executioner in a moment of passion. That's for the outside world." He points again out the window. "That's for the brutish, survival-of-the-fittest, dog-eats-dog world we all fought so hard to escape, the world we all built so long to guard ourselves against. That's not for Jamestown. That's not for us."

The prosecutor steps closer to the jury pew. " I know the task you have been given is not a pleasant one. I know you're sympathetic to the defendant, and he is not wholly undeserving of your sympathy. But you have a job to do here. And your job is to uphold justice, to uphold order, to uphold the law – to uphold Jamestown itself. And in order to do that, however unpleasant it may be, you _must_ convict."

Carol glances at the jury. They seem moved by the prosecutor's words. She's not entirely unmoved by them herself, though her sympathies lie with her friend.

The defense attorney rises next, looking very much like he's not sure how to follow that act. He clears his throat. "The prosecutor has spoken to you of law. But I wish to speak to you of mercy. We citizens of Jamestown are a people of the law, and that has preserved us well in these uncertain and unstable times, but we are also a people of _mercy_. Mercy is what has allowed us to grow our populace, to take in talented people with questionable pasts, like some of you might once have been, to thrive, to triumph over the ugly history that haunts us all. Mercy has allowed us to press on to a brighter future."

The defense attorney thoughtfully strokes his beard and takes a step closer to the jury. "Now, all the evidence clearly points to Candy Nilson having been brutally raped by Mr. Meadows, but it's not your job to decide that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Mr. Meadows is not the accused here today, Gunther unfortunately is. It's only your job to put yourself in Gunther's shoes. I think it's quite clear that he was overcome with anger, grief, and compassion when he saw the injuries and abuse his long-time friend suffered at the hands of Mr. Meadows. In a moment of overwhelming emotion, for the love of a friend, Gunther made a poor decision, one any of you, if you put yourself in his place, must know you might have made. He wasn't planning to kill Mr. Meadows. He didn't even _intend_ to kill him. He simply lost control of himself. The death of Mr. Meadows just _happened_. And it might _not_ have happened if we'd had superior medical technology. The terrible circumstances of Candy's rape, as Gunther perceived it, coupled with Gunther's outstanding character, should mitigate your sentence."

The defense attorney extends a hand toward Gunther in the side pew. "Gunther himself is aware his behavior was not appropriate, and he's not unwilling to pay some reasonable penalty for that. That's why he plead guilty to aggravated assault. But he doesn't deserve to be tainted with the stain of voluntary manslaughter, or to suffer even the minimum penalty that crime carries. You have a modest range of sentencing options available to you for aggravated assault alone. Choose one of those, and let it satisfy your need for justice. Because while the world needs justice, it also needs mercy. Consider how desperately our world, with all its trials and tribulations and gray areas – consider how desperately it – and you" He points to the jury "and I" he points to himself "and Gunther" he points to the defendant, "and _all_ of us - need _mercy_. We _all_ need mercy. Consider that, and acquit the defendant of this ugly charge against him."

Judge Annette picks up her gavel. "The jury will now deliberate. We will reconvene in the morning if a verdict has been reached. This court is now adjourned." She bangs her gavel against the card table, and a murmur of voices fills the chapel.


	169. Chapter 169

Daryl's getting ready to head to the Hilltop with Raul when Dianne approaches and asks, "May I speak to you for a moment? Privately?"

Raul sighs. The young man is itching to get to his girlfriend. Daryl holds up a single finger to him, to suggest he won't be long, and then follows Dianne to the shade of a tree. She leans against the partially raw bark with one shoulder. "Do you think he'll die?"

"Gunther?"

"The man he attacked."

"Shit," Daryl mutters. Gunther gave him that letter before they got word of Edgar's death. He packed it with all the other letters in his satchel, and that night they got the bad news. Daryl left early the next morning, while Carol was still asleep. He grabbed his pack quietly, scrawled out that love letter, hid it in her footlocker, where he knew she'd find it soon enough, and slipped out the door. "Uh…He did. Die. After Gunther wrote that letter. Didn't have a chance to write ya a new one 'fore I left."

Dianne closes her eyes. When she opens them, her teeth are gritted together as if she's holding back. "So he'll be charged with manslaughter?"

"Yeah. He was. 'S trial's s'posed to be today."

"Do you think he'll be convicted?"

"Ain't got no idea, honestly."

"What's the maximum penalty for that? It isn't execution, is it?"

"Nah! No. Banishment's the worse."

"That would be _like_ death for Gunther," Dianne says.

"Ain't like he's gonna have to survive on his own. 'M sure y'all would take 'em in. Wouldn't Cyndie agree to that?" Cyndie knows what it's like to kill someone out of anger, not even in the heat of passion, but at a time of peace. Cyndie went behind Rick's law and made her own law to execute those Saviors. She won't judge Gunther. Not for a second.

"That's not what I meant," Dianne replies. "I'm sure Cynide would welcome him into Oceanside. He'd be an asset. He'd expand our garden plots and breed our chickens, maybe even start some crops. He'd make us less reliant on the sea. But he's lived in Jamestown almost nine years. He _loves_ that town like it's his own child. It would break his heart to have to leave it and to leave his friends behind."

Daryl know she's right, as far as Gunther is concerned, even though he doesn't quite understand the feeling. There's never been anywhere he couldn't leave. He likes Jamestown, and it's probably the closest place to a home he's ever had, but if he had to walk away tomorrow, and never turn back, as long as he had Carol and Sweetheart by his side, he'd be just fine.

"How did he seem when you left?" Dianne asks. "Was he holding up?"

"Honestly," Daryl murmurs, "think the thing that bothered 'em the most was worryin' how you'd react. 'S afraid it would make ya not want 'em."

Dianne smiles. It almost transforms her face when she does that. The hard edges fade away and she looks suddenly more feminine. "I have to admit, that's nice to hear. When I first started reading his letter, I thought he was telling me something completely different."

"Why's that?"

"It was the way he led into it. The first few lines went – _I'm sorry I'm not there to see you like I promised. I've done something in the heat of passion I regret. I'm not sure you'll want to see me after you know about it. On Tuesday night, Candy came naked into my room…_ I thought he was about to tell me he'd slept with her!"

"Pffft!"

"Yeah, silly, I know. I mean, he didn't seem attracted to her the two times I've been at Jamestown."

"Candy ain't no competition."

"I know. And neither is Linda. Or Trisha. They're all just close friends. But the way he put it, for a minute…" She shakes her head. "And it made me realize how pissed off and torn-up I'd be if he had done that. We never said we were exclusive, but…I guess I just assumed."

From where he stands by the motorcycle, Raul yells, "Honk, honk!"

"Hold yer damn horses!" Daryl yells back.

"You better get that poor, besotten Romeo to his Juliet," Dianne tells him. "He's been moping around all morning, just shinning that bike."

"Yeah."

"But don't head back to Jamestown without checking in with me first?"

"A'right." Daryl figures she'll have a letter for him to bring back to Gunther. He waves to her and wanders back to his bike, where he tells Raul, "Yer in the front."

Raul grins. "You're letting _me_ drive it?"

"Told ya that ya gotta practice. Though I ain't never sat in the back like a girl 'fore. So keep yer ass off my cock."

"Yeah, well, keep your cock off my ass," Raul tells him with a smirk as he straddles the bike.

Daryl mounts the bike behind him.

"You're not going to hold on?" Raul asks.

"I like ya, but I don't like ya that much. Just don't pop any damn wheelies."

"Can you show me how to do that?" Raul asks with excitement.

"No."

Raul shrugs and then kicks the motorcycle to a roaring start, and they tear off through the open gates of Oceanside, up the peninsula's dirt road, which will lead them to the highway and then on to the Hilltop.

[*]

Because it's Carol's day off, she picks up Sweetheart after the trial and spends some time walking with her along the docks of Jamestown, pointing out the birds and skipping rocks across the water.

"Bow" Sweetheart says, pointing to the _Godspeed_. "Bow!" It's the same word she uses for Daryl's crossbow, but in this case she means _boat_.

"We call it a ship," Commander Witherspoon tells her, coming to a stop beside them. "Would she like a tour?"

"I think she would," Carol says. "We're planning to take her to the trade fair in November. She should probably get used to a ship."

They climb up the ramp together and, once they're onboard and walking around, Sweetheart with her hand in Carol's, Witherspoon says, "Listen, what you heard in jury selection, about my twenty-first birthday par - "

"- It's no concern of mine."

"I really didn't know how to say no. Captain John Smith was my boss. I was just an ensign then. I was young and stupid, and all the guys - "

"- It's really no concern of mine," Carol repeats.

Sweetheart pulls her hand from Carol's and toddle-runs up to the ship's wheel. She climbs up onto the pedestal and grabs one of the handles and tries to spin it like a roulette wheel, but of course it doesn't budge.

"I haven't ever told Mitch about it," Witherspoon says as he and Carol follow the toddler.

"Well, he won't hear it from me, but he'll probably hear it from someone. If he hasn't _already_. And I doubt he'll care. It's not like you did it yesterday." She goes over to the ship's wheel. Sweetheart is now hanging off one of the handles with one foot on the ground and one foot off, as if she's on a piece of jungle gym equipment.

"You don't know Mitch," Witherspoon says. "He's surprisingly moralistic."

Carol doubts that. She can't see Daryl being good friends with a moralistic man. A moral man, certainly, and honorable man, but not a _moralistic_ one. "Well, I suspect he'll forgive you. I don't think Mitch is the one with the problem about it. I think _you're_ the one who feels guilty about it."

"I do," he admits. "It's not how my mother raised me."

"Well, my mother didn't raise me to kill people," Carol tells him. "And I've killed a lot more than I wanted to. Maybe more than I had to. But guilt is nothing but an albatross around your neck. You've got to cut it loose." She plucks up Sweetheart, who laughs, and walks away from the wheel a little way before setting her down again. The little girl toddles off toward the main mast.

"How did the trial go?" Witherspoon asks. "I mean, I know you can't tell me much, but…in general?"

"They're deliberating. The judge is expecting an answer by morning. I really have no idea how they'll rule."

"Marcus is a good prosecutor," the commander says, "but James is a good defense attorney. They're both good at their jobs. And sometimes the town hates one, and sometimes it hates the other. It just depends who's on trial and for what."

"I suppose so," Carol says. "I appreciated James when he was defending us, and I appreciated Marcus when he was prosecuting those mutineers."

"It must be strange, having a job like that. No one ever resents a man for sailing a ship. Especially not when that ship comes back full of fish."

"Well, sometimes they resent some of the decisions of the council," Carol reasons. " _That_ can be a thankless job."

"True," Witherspoon agrees. "And being mayor has to be the most thankless job of all. You're paid for twenty hours and you work at least fifty. If anything goes wrong, you're to blame."

"So you're not throwing your hat in the ring when you're re-elected in July?" Carol asks.

" _If_ I'm re-elected in July," he clarifies. "And no. And I don't know who I'll vote for either. I don't feel like either Dr. Ahmad or Carolyn are truly ready. I wish Garland could serve again. He's good at it. They should have made the mayor's term-limit six years. Or at least four. I guess two years seemed like a lifetime when they drew up the new charter. But it's gone by so quickly."

"It sure has." There have been a lot of changes in that short time for Carol. Settling into married life, the Kingdom collapsing, moving to Jamestown, becoming a citizen, then a council member, and then adopting Sweetheart.

Sweetheart futilely tries to climb the mast. She stumbles back. "Up!" she demands, pointing at the crow's nest above. "Up! Up! Up!"

"She wants to be the lookout," Witherspoon says with a smile. "She'll make a good sailor. Or a watchman."

"Up! Up! Up!"

"You're not going up there, Sweetie," Carol tells her.

Sweetheart makes a big pouting face, furrows her brow, puts one hand on her hip, and tells Carol, "No!"

"Yep, that's what I said. No."

"Up!" Sweetheart demands.

"That attitude is not going to fly around here, little missy," Carol tells her.

"Let's go on below deck," Witherspoon suggests. "She can climb the bunks."

The bunk climbing happily distracts Sweetheart, and Carol and Commander Witherspoon talk a little more. Carol glances into the captain's cabin. "I thought you moved out?" There are books all over the desk, the bed is made up with sheets, a pillow, and a light blanket, and there are storage boxes beneath it.

"I did. I mean, I just stayed in Mitch's hut after the winter. But Lieutenant Alvarado moved in here. He's upgrading from the second officer's cabin. Now he's got an entire ship to himself, just like Captain McBride and Lieutenant Commander Lawson. Well, Lawson shares the _Discovery_ with his wife."

"It's like having a mansion," Carol says.

"I prefer cozy. And I prefer the company I have now. Not that I dislike Carlos. He's a good guy. I just…" He grins. "Like Mitch better."

Carol chuckles and is about to respond when there's a thud and a wail, She quickly turns and scoops Sweetheart up into her arms from the floor. She checks the toddler over and looks around for clues as to whether she fell from the bottom or top bunk, but there's no telling. The girls cries turn to sniffles now that mama has her, and she wipes her eyes against Carol's shoulder. "I forgot how carefully you have to keep an eye on them at this age," she tells Witherspoon. "We're so safe from walkers and bandits in here, I forget about all the ordinary dangers we used to face."

"It's strange," Witherspoon muses. "I've slain hundreds of walkers, fought back two raids, and yet, one day, I'll probably just slip in the shower, hit my head, and drown in an inch of water."

"Well now you've got me paranoid about showers," Carol grumbles.

"Good thing we only get one a week."

[*]

The gates of the Hilltop swing open before Raul and Daryl even reach them, and the motorcycle glides through. Raul jerks it to an abrupt stop, which causes Daryl to almost fall off. He catches himself with a boot to the ground and dismounts.

Enid is waiting for them. She throws her arms around Raul when he dismounts and kisses him straight on the lips. When she pulls away, she says, "You got here sooner than I expected."

Grinning, Raul replies, "The ship had good winds. I would have been here even sooner, but Dixon was dragging his feet."

"Thanks, Daryl," Daryl says. "Thanks for lettin' me use yer bike. Would of taken a damn long time to _walk_ to the Hilltop."

"You better mind your p's and q's," Aaron warns Raul as he approaches the group. "Or Daddy Daryl will put you in line." He smiles. "How's the baby?"

"Ain't much of a baby anymore. She's walkin'. Runnin'. Stumbles like a drunk when she does, but she's runnin'. Even climbin' a bit. Talkin' up a storm. Forty-four words now."

Aaron laughs. "You've counted?"

"Carol writes 'em all down."

"I'm glad you're here." Aaron steps forward and gives Daryl a hug.

"Hershel's still in school," Enid tells Daryl when Aaron pulls away. "It lets out in half an hour. Do you mind having a sleepover with him in the loft of the barn for the next two nights?"

"Ya got the kid in the _loft_?"

"No. But he doesn't have his own room anymore, since we took in the Kingdom refugees. He shares my bedroom in the main house. I just thought, you know…for the next two nights…"

"Please?" Raul asks.

"Oh, _now_ ya know how to say please."

"Sorry," Raul tells him. "I've just – "

"- 'M just bustin' yer balls, kid," Daryl interrupts. "'Course I'll camp out with m' nephew. Be fun. Make s'mores."

"No open fires in the barn," Aaron warns.

Daryl rolls his eyes. "'S jokin'. We ain't got chocolate or graham crackers neither."

"Or marshmallows," Raul says.

"Oh, no, we have those," Aaron tells him. "We make them using the gelatin we get from boiling pig's bones."

"Seriously?" Raul asks.

"You're in for a real treat." Enid takes his hand. "Come on, I'll let you have _one_."

Aaron half turns to watch them walking away. "So that's serious, is it?"

"Reckon," Daryl says.

Aaron turns back. "She stayed in his room the last two times she was at Jamestown?"

"What are you? Her daddy?" Daryl begins rolling his bike toward the barn, where he used to park it when he lived at the Hilltop, to keep it out of any potential rain.

Aaron falls in step beside him. "No, I'm just the Director of Human Resources for the Hilltop. I don't want her moving to Jamestown. She's our head doctor."

"That's yer dumbass title? Director of Human Resources?"

Aaron chuckles. "Of course not. I was joking. They call me Supreme Leader."

"Stahp."

"Top dog."

"Well," Daryl murmurs, "just Jesus. In bed."

Aaron snorts.


	170. Chapter 170

Hershel is finally big enough to shoot the youth crossbow Daryl scavenged for him a few years ago and left in the Hilltop's armory. So they spend an hour at the Hilltop's archery range. Daryl can't help but think of the time Carl asked to shoot his crossbow, back on the Greene family farm, and Daryl dismissively told him his arms weren't long enough. They weren't, not for an adult bow, but Daryl wishes he hadn't been so gruff with Carl back then. He could have at least showed the kid a thing or two. He didn't know that the boy's father would eventually become like a brother to him, or that both Rick and Carl would be forever lost to him.

So even though it's frustrating teaching Hershel to shoot, Daryl persists. The kids on target – at least I the outer ring – by the time they're done. That evening they have dinner with Aaron and Jesus at a picnic table outside the main house.

"The loft's all made up for you," Aaron tells Daryl.

"Be like old times," Daryl says. He slept there for three years, after all, before he got upgraded to the room in the mansion. "All m' old furniture still up there?"

"If you can call it furniture," Aaron replies.

Daryl made a bookshelf of two wooden planks divided by cinderblocks and a table from a milkcrate. He had a mattress sealed in plastic, which he used as a base mat for his sleeping bag. He left it all behind when he moved into the already furnished room in the mansion, and the Hilltop used that loft as a spare room for visitors from other communities.

"Enid made up the mattress for you," Jesus says. "Fresh sheets. And she checked it for bugs. But the plastic does a good job keeping them out."

"And the teenagers who sneak up there keep it dusted off," Aaron quips.

Daryl winces. "Did Enid wipe it down with bleach, too?"

"When did you get so finicky?" Aaron asks. "Carol's really domesticated you."

"Pfft."

"Where is Enid anyway?" Jesus wants to know. "I saw her and Raul mixing medicines earlier, but I haven't seen her since."

"I suspect they went to bed early," Aaron replies. He points to Daryl with his fork. "Two rounds of ammo and a marshmallow says he doesn't go back with you to Jamestown the day after tomorrow."

"'S goin' back," Daryl insists. "Promised his daddy I wouldn't leave 'em behind. And Jamestown don't want to lose their apothecary."

Hershel pushes his empty plate forward on the picnic table. "Time to roast marshmallows!" He smacks his lips together, and for a second, he looks just like Glenn.

[*]

A knock sounds on Carol's door just as she finishes cleaning up Sweetheart's face after dinner. When Carol swings the door open, Shannon says, "You need a drink after that trial." It's not a question. It's a statement. "Pack Sweetheart's diaper bag. Garland will watch her. We're going to the tavern."

"Yes, ma'am!"

The tavern isn't too busy, but both waitresses are there. At the moment, Candy's at the far end of the bar, not really working, sitting on a stool next to Deputy Thomas and talking to him as he checks her splinted wrist.

"How's Candy doing?" Shannon asks sympathetically as they take two stools on the opposite end of the bar where Trisha is pouring a pint and Madam Linda sits working on the books.

Linda lets out a sigh. "She didn't sleep well last night. She kept waking up crying, poor thing. Eventually we came down from the loft, and I lit the fire and put on the juke box." That's what they call the wind-up record player Santiago brought them from one of his scavenging expeditions. The speakers are primitive, and the sound's not loud enough to fill the whole tavern, but anyone at the bar can hear it playing. "We listened to music and talked. I think she'll heal, but it will take a while."

Trisha puts one pint on the bar and begins to draw another. "Deputy Thomas is helping her." She looks in their direction and smiles. "I think Candy's made a friend." She picks up the pints and goes to serve them to Mitch and Commander Witherspoon, who are having dinner together at a table by the stage.

Linda slides off her stool and lifts up a section of the bar to slip behind it. "Vodka appletini?"

"You still have vodka?" Carol asks doubtfully.

"You have a reserved half bottle."

"What?"

"Daryl paid for it, in its entirety, upfront, on condition I didn't serve it to _anyone_ but you."

Carol laughs. "Seriously?"

She nods.

"In that case, I think he's hoping to reap the benefits, so I'll wait to have one when he's home. I'll just have a beer."

"Me too," Shannon tells her. "Where did Daryl get the ammo for a half bottle of liquor? At bar markup?"

"Well, he's rationed twenty rounds a week as a hunter and he _never_ shoots a single one. And he's been working overtime lately, mostly for Sweetheart's milk, though."

"Garland's been working a lot of overtime, too. I'll be glad when he's not mayor anymore," Shannon says. "He's thinking of going back to work for the Sheriff's Department when he steps down to councilman. Just as a deputy. Like the olden days. Before I even met him. He says he misses the scouting and scavenging. I don't know about him being gone overnight, though."

Linda resumes her spot on her stool and returns to her books, though Carol doesn't have any illusions she's not also listening to their conversation.

"It's not that often," Carol assures Shannon. "Not every deputy gets sent on every trip. Two days here. Two days there. And when he _is_ home, he'll be working far less than he does as mayor. For the same pay."

"But the nights away from each other are hard, aren't they? You already miss Daryl, don't you?"

"I miss having him to lean on," Carol says. "And by the day after tomorrow, I'll probably miss the sex, too."

Shannon chuckles.

"But I kind of like having a _little_ time to myself," Carol admits. "A week's far too long. A night here in there…though…that doesn't bother me."

James, the defense attorney, comes over, leans on the bar, and calls to Linda, "We never got those shots."

Carol glances in the direction from which he came and notices the prosecutor at a table in the corner. They're apparently drinking together.

"I'll pour _you_ one, but not _him_ ," Madam Linda mutters. "Marcus doesn't _deserve_ those shots."

"Come on, Linda! He's just doing his job," James replies.

Linda sighs, swings up the cut-out section of the bar, and walks through, muttering, "You saw the way he tried to skewer me on that stand! Tried to get me to say bad things about poor Gunther."

"The law only works if you have men willing to prosecute and men willing to defend," James tell her. "I'm just glad it's not _me_ people are pissed off at for a change."

Linda pours the two shots and pushes them across the bar. James lifts up one and peers at the liquid, which rises only about half a finger. "That's a very light pour, Linda."

"That one's _his_. He should be glad I didn't spit in it."

James shakes his head, pours a little of the second one – which is slightly _over_ poured – into the first until they're even. "You know," he says, "if Edgar had lived, Marcus would have ripped apart my defense and made sure that bastard hanged." He takes the shot glasses and walks off.

"I hope we have a verdict by morning," Linda says as she goes back through the bar again. "I can't stand all this waiting."

[*]

Daryl gives the freshly made mattress to Hershel to sleep on and rolls out his sleeping bag beside it, on the scattered hay. An oil lamp sits on the empty, top shelf of the makeshift bookcase, the flame safely trapped by a glass enclosure. The light flickers on the exposed beams of the loft's ceiling. Hershel's dog Puck lies on the ground below, half snoozing and half guarding the open entrance of the barn. The bitch Dog knocked up a few years ago had a litter of five pups, but only two survived into adulthood – the boy, Puck, and a girl, Scout. One died upon entrance to the world. Two got loose burrowing beneath the Hilltop fence and got devoured by walkers. Daryl's not sure who named the survivors, but one day, Puck and Scout was what everyone was calling them. He just called them Pup One and Pup Two.

Hershel accidentally drops his grandfather's pocket watch, which he apparently sleeps with now closed in his hand like some kind of strange teddy bear. The chain inches beneath the mattress. He fishes out the chain, furrows his little brow in puzzlement, and then puts his fingers back under the mattress again. He pulls out a magazine. In the flickering light of the lamp, Daryl sees it's a porno mag. Hershel stares at the front cover. "Why's that lady naked?"

Daryl snatches the magazine from his hand. "That was never mine." He shoves it back under the mattress. "Some kids must hide 'em up here."

"But why was she naked?"

"'Cause when boys get older, they like to look at naked chicks."

"Why?"

"'Cause they're nice to look at."

"Did my dad like to look at naked chicks?" Hershel asks.

"Mostly yer mama."

"Do _you_ like to look at naked chicks?"

"Mostly yer Aunt Carol."

"Aunt Enid tells me not to call women chicks."

"Well, listen to yer Aunt Enid then," Daryl tells him. He rolls on his back and settles an arm behind his head. He remembers the patterns the lamp used to cast on those beams almost like the back of his hand. They're the same. It's strange, to think he once slept here alone, night after night, no wife in his bed, no best friend warming his side. And he thought that was normal. He thought that was going to be the rest of his life.

"What did my dad do before the Outbreak?" Hershel asks. "Was he in the army? Did he drive a tank?"

Bittersweet pangs of memory wrench Daryl's lips into a sad smile. This is how it goes anytime they spend a night together – a sea of questions about his dead parents. Daryl's the only one alive, besides Carol, who knew Glenn since the Atlanta Survivor Camp, the only one, besides Carol, who knew Maggie since the farm. But he's not going to tell Hershel that Glenn was a pizza delivery boy.

"Well, not a tank, but…" Daryl lowers his voice to a secretive whisper, "he drove a real important vehicle. 'N he worked for an organization that…well…I can't say its name. But he had to deliver things, if ya know what I mean."

"Secret messages?" Hershel asks with excitement.

"Well, there were sheets of paper taped inside the boxes he delivered, with numbers printed on them."

Hershel half sits up now. He clutches his grandfather's big pocket watch in his little hand. He whispers, "Like a secret code?"

'S all 'm at liberty to say."

"Come on! You can tell me! Come on, Uncle Daryl!"

"Well, maybe I can tell you _one_ more thing. Yer daddy knew the layout of Atlanta like the back of his hand. Could get anywhere in that city real stealthy like."

"Wow." Hershel's quiet for a long moment. He lies back down. Then he asks the question Daryl's always hoped he wouldn't. "Who killed my dad?"

Negan's dead now. When Alexandria was raided after the defeat of the Saviors, they let him out to fight, and he died in the battle, but not before bringing down several of the raiders. Some people think he redeemed himself in the end, but Daryl's not so sure there's any coming back from what he did to Glenn and Abraham, from what he did to Daryl, too. "Just some asshole," Daryl mutters.

"He was a Savior," Glenn says.

So he's been told something, by someone. Enid maybe. Or Aaron. Or Jesus. "Yeah."

"What was his name?" Hershel asks. "The man who killed my father?"

"Don't deserve a name. Don't worry 'bout it."

"The Saviors are good guys now," Hershel says. "The ones at the Hilltop."

"We got rid of all the bad ones." Some in the war, and some, later, at the tip of the spears of Oceanside's women, but he doesn't say that.

"They'll probably be in the history book."

"What history book?" Daryl asks.

"Mr. Eugene's writing a history book. For the schools in the Alliance."

"Oh yeah?"

"Aunt Enid says it's going to need a _serious_ editor."

Daryl snorts. "Reckon it will. Get some sleep, kid. 'S getting' late."

Hershel rolls on his side to face Daryl. Daryl sits up and turns the lamp down to the faintest glow.

"I don't need a night light anymore," Hershel tells him. "I'm not afraid of the dark anymore."

"'Course ya ain't," Daryl says softly, and a little sadly. He turns the lamp all the way off.

[*]

Carol turns the key in the jail cell. "Deputy Andrew's sick this morning, so I'm playing bailiff," she tells Gunther. "You look nice."

"Garland came by and leant me a proper shirt again." He rolls his shoulders stiffly. "It's very tight on me. I guess I'll be fine as long as I don't have to raise my arms."

"Breathe," she tells him when he walks out of the cell, because he's looking a little blue in the face.

He lets out a long puff of air. "Kind of hard to do right now. This sentence could be anything, all the way up to banishment. I've been praying half the night."

"I didn't know you were religious." Carol's never seen him at the chapel during services, which she attends sporadically herself, about once or twice a month.

"I'm not. But I figured it couldn't hurt."

Carol smiles. She leads him to the courtroom, where he takes his seat in the side pew beside his lawyer. The jury is already in the jury pew, and the prosecutor sits at his side pew.

The court reporter turns to a clean page.

"All rise," Carol intones. "The Honorable Judge Annette Howard presiding."

The judge makes her entrance from the sacristy and takes a seat behind the card table. She pounds her gavel, and everyone sits. "Would the foreman of the jury please rise," Judge Annette says.

Dante stands.

"Jury, have you reached verdict in the case of Jamestown vs. Gunther Hamilton?"

"We have, your honor."

"And on the charge of voluntary manslaughter, how do you find?"

Now Carol's the one holding her breath.


	171. Chapter 171

Daryl opens a single eye and looks into Herhsel's face. The boy lets out a giggle. His laugh still has that little boy quality to it. Daryl thinks that will probably be gone by the next time he sees the kid in November. "'S so damn funny?" he asks.

"You didn't notice me staring at you. You slept five more minutes once I started! I thought you always sensed danger."

"Kid, you ain't danger."

"I _will_ be." Hershel throws himself onto his back on the mattress. "One day."

"Probably," Daryl agrees and drags himself into a sitting position. "'S for breakfast? Donuts, right?"

"What are donuts?"

"Someday, Hershey, m'boy. Someday I'll figure out how to make ya one."

[*]

Dante grits his teeth so hard Carol can see a pulse in his jawline. It's a bad sign, she thinks. He doesn't _want_ to deliver the verdict he's about to deliver. Dante clears his throat. "After long and serious deliberation," he says, all his usual jovialness gone from his face and tone, "and in keeping with the law as it is written, your honor, we feel we have no choice but to find the defendant guilty as charged."

Gunther hangs his head and Carol momentarily closes her eyes.

"However," Dante continues, which causes Carol's eyes to fly open again, "we rule that the conviction for aggravated assault be subsumed into the voluntary manslaughter conviction, as is our right as a jury to rule. Thus, these two convictions will become one, and in conjunction with the defendant's former conviction for assault four years ago, will _not_ trigger the three strikes rule."

A little bit of the tension eases out of Carol's frame now. This must mean the jury won't banish Gunther.

"And what is your sentence for the combined strike of voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault?" the judge asks.

"We understand that the bare minimum sentence allowed by law for this charge is a fine of eight ounces of tobacco, eight days of incarceration, and thirty days of hard labor at reduced rations. Therefore, we sentence the defendant to pay a fine of eight ounces of tobacco over a period of sixteen months, at a rate of one-half ounce per month."

More tension eases from Carol's frame. Spreading out the fine over such a long period ensures that Gunther will barely notice the pinch, especially considering that he grows tobacco of his own.

Dante continues, "We sentence the defendant to those required thirty days of hard labor at his _current_ occupation of assistant farm manager, which already involves toil in the fields and barns, and which we therefore rule should qualify as _hard_. His rations shall be reduced during that thirty-day period as required by law. We reduce them by an amount equivalent to two hours per week."

The usual reduction accompanying a sentence to hard labor is five to ten hours' worth of rations. Given that Gunther works so much overtime, again, he'll hardly feel the pinch. He'll still be receiving more than full rations.

"Finally, we sentence the defendant to eight days of incarceration, as required by law. However, his two days already served awaiting trial and this verdict shall count toward his sentence."

Six more days in jail, and then back to work as usual. Other than the boredom and embarrassment of incarceration, the farmer will hardly feel the verdict. It's a slap on the wrist for a conviction as serious as voluntary manslaughter. The jury has found a way to uphold the letter of the law, while still showing the spirit of mercy. Gunther raises his head from his hands and looks almost delirious with relief.

"Finally, upon completion of his sentence in thirty-six days," Dante continues, "we rule that all rights of citizenship in their entirety shall be fully restored to the defendant."

 _Just in time for the council elections_ , Carol thinks. _Well played._

[*]

Aaron and Daryl creep through the trees into the clearing. There it is. The horse. The brown mare wears a dusty brown saddle that has become slightly loose. Aaron said that three weeks ago some scavengers went to check an abandoned farm fifteen miles west of the Hilltop for extra nails. It appeared five people had settled there sometime in the last few months. As best as the scavengers could tell, sickness overtook them. Two of them died in the night and turned and feasted on the others, who may have been too weak from sickness to fight back. Two of the horses they'd brought with them were picked over by the walkers, but one, as best they could tell from the tracks, had managed to escape by jumping over a fence. The Hilltop's been looking for it.

Daryl silently inches toward the horse with the lasso now. Aaron stays back, knife drawn, ready to slay any walkers that attempt to thwart them. They aren't losing a horse this time, Daryl thinks, not like they did all those years ago, when Daryl first came to Alexandria. The brown mare lowers its head and tears at the grass. Daryl seizes the opportunity. He flings the lasso, and it lands perfectly. His body coursing with adrenaline, and prepared for a wild struggle, Daryl pulls tight, but the horse just stands there. It lowers its head once again and begins to feed.

Aaron laughs. "Well," he says as he sheaths his knife and walks out of the cover of the tall grass. "That was anticlimactic."

"She ain't gone wild yet."

Aaron steps up to the mare and strokes it's nose. "Hey, girl. What's your name I wonder?"

Daryl checks the animal over for walker bites, but finds only a light scratch on its side, probably from thorns.

"Well, I'll let Hershel name you, then," Aaron tells the horse. "You want to come home and make some new friends? We've got a really handsome stallion at the Hilltop."

"She don't care 'bout no damn stallion," Daryl tells him. "Tell 'er 'bout the sugar cubes."

[*]

When Carol finishes up her patrol shift, before picking up Sweetheart, she stops by the jailhouse. As she opens the wooden door and enters, she's intrigued by the sound of music drifting from the cell. Gunther is lounging on top of his unrolled sleeping bag, leaned back against the iron bars, one arm slung over his knee, as the wind-up record player from the tavern sends out the last few bars of a Merle Haggard song before the record ends and the needle retracts.

"Hey," she says. "I see Linda's brought you some entertainment."

"Sheriff Earl said it was all right."

"Well, I doubt you'll pick the lock with it. Though you probably could find a way to take it apart and do that with the needle."

Gunther chuckles. "Not me. I'm not that talented." He draws himself to his feet. "It's not dinner time already is it?"

"No, but," she pulls a pack of cards from her pants pocket, "I thought I'd keep you company for a bit?"

"I'd appreciate that."

She unlocks the cell door, and they settle at the little wooden table. "Gin rummy?" she asks.

"Sure."

As Carol deals, Gunther says, "You know, this isn't the worse punishment in the world. I don't have to work at all for six days, and I still get fed. It would have made more sense to give me six more days of so-called hard labor, if you ask me."

"The law requires a few days of incarceration." Carol sets the deck down on the table and slides her hand to herself. "I don't think you're supposed to feel like it's a vacation. It's _supposed_ to be unpleasant and make you feel like you don't want to repeat the experience."

Gunther smiles. "I guess I'm not supposed to have someone stopping by to visit me every couple of hours, either. Y'all have been kind. Candy talked Deputy Thomas into letting me out to have a long walk with her this morning. He trailed behind to make sure I didn't make a run for it. Either that or to admire her form." Carol chuckles. "She says she's done with turning tricks for good, and I almost believe her, she sounded so sincere. Then I was back in the cell for an hour before Earl got me out to eat lunch with me. He kept me out for two games of checkers. Linda brought me the record player just before Earl locked me back in, and then she stayed and talked to me for almost an hour. I've been listening to records ever since. And now I have you."

"And Santiago's bringing you dinner later," Carol says. "I'll drop off another stack of books in the morning."

Gunther draws a card, arranges his hand, and then discards. "Do you think Daryl told Dianne my charge got upgraded to voluntary manslaughter? I didn't know when I wrote the letter."

"If she asked."

"Think she'll lose respect for me when she hears it?"

"No." Carol discards. "I don't. Dianne's killed far more men than you."

"But not in peace time. She might be worried, you know…that I can't control myself. That I'm the kind of man who lets my anger overcome me."

"Except you're not, most of the time. Quite the opposite."

He rubs his eyes and sighs. "Because I try so hard _not_ to be that man." He picks up a card. "My ex-wife…she thought I was too short tempered. On account of I sometimes punched holes in the drywall." Carol raises an eyebrow. "When something frustrating would happen," he explains. "Once, when cattle rustlers ran off with two of my cows, and once when that worm infestation killed half the crops. When I found out my folks had taken out a second mortgage on the house I didn't know about. Or when I learned she was sleeping with that man…She said it's one of the reasons she cheated, and why she finally left me. My anger."

"Oh."

"I never raised a hand to her, I swear. Or my children. But…I did overreact sometimes. I let my temper get the better of me. Drove her away. I thought I would become a better man. Earn her back, you know. And for a while, I did. Or _thought_ I did. It turned out she never ended the affair. And when I found that out…well, all my trying to be calm went to shit. I broke the man's nose. And that was the final straw. She packed up after that. Left me for good. With the boys."

Carol just listens as they play. He seems to need to talk. But she wants to say that his wife couldn't have been too concerned about his anger if she left her sons with him. Either that, or she couldn't have been too concerned about her sons.

"I've tried not to be like that, ever since she left me. I didn't want to set that example for the boys. I was calmer than my father had been, and I wanted them to be calmer than me. I started reading books on zen and meditation. I never could meditate, though. It bored me to tears. But I did learn to calm myself. And I'd been doing well…up until that altercation with the old commander."

"I suspect Harold deserved it," Carol says.

"He was better liked then, you know, before he became the villain of the mutiny of 7 NE. But since then, I've been in fine control of myself. Or so I thought. I just…" He shakes his head. "I lost it, Carol. I don't think I even knew what I was doing until you and Raul wrestled me off."

"He was a rapist, Gunther." She draws a card. "He raped Candy and he broke her wrist and he gave her a black eye. Before that, he was a peeping tom. He was a problem, and he would have become an even bigger one. His death is no loss to Jamestown, and Jamestown would have executed him if you didn't. I understand why the jury felt the need to uphold law and order, to support the legal process over vigilantism. I understand this place is trying to restore civilization to a world that's been without it for a long time. But no one actually cares that you killed Edgar. And no one thinks any less of you because of it. And I'm sure Dianne won't either." She turns a card upside down as she discards it. "Rummy."

[*]

Hershel slurps his wheat spaghetti off the plate in one long string and then laughs. Gracie, who sits across from the little boy at the table, does the same thing in imitation of him.

"Reminds me of when Eric and I first had you over for dinner," Aaron tells Daryl. "Eric was so impressed by your manners."

"Ya know…ya reached out to me at a time I would of just shut everyone out if ya hadn't. Never said thank you for that."

"You did," Aaron tells him. "In your way." He twirls the spaghetti around his fork. "I miss him still. Sometimes. Eric. I - "

Aaron falls silent as Jesus enters and sets his plate down and takes a chair next to him. Jesus pulls back a chair. ""I'm disappointed you didn't join my martial arts class today, Daryl." He sits.

"Ain't into that. Use a bow."

"You use knives," Jesus tells him. "A lot. And forms can come in handy when you're using knives."

"Know how to stab shit. Don't need to look pretty doin' it."

Jesus shrugs. "Well, I tried."

"Let's race," Herhsel tells Gracie, and they both slurp a string of spaghetti off their plates. Herhsel's disappears into his mouth first. "I win!"

"Have they seen Lady and the Tramp?" Raul sets his plate down next to Daryl's, and Enid sits opposite him.

She chuckles. "Don't try to match them up. They're too much like brother and sister."

"They aren't blood related, though, right?" Raul asks as he pulls out his chair and sits down. "It's a small world, you know."

"It's getting bigger," Jesus says. "It's good to have you, Raul. Thanks for everything you've been teaching Enid about mixing medicines."

"Well, she's been teaching me, too. How to do stitches and other stuff. I sewed up a guy today!"

Jesus raises an eyebrow. "You're already letting him experiment on your patients?"

"He's a quick learner," Enid insists.

"Can we wait to leave until after lunch tomorrow?" Raul asks Daryl. "It takes less than an hour on the bike. The ship's not leaving until two."

"Nah," Daryl mutters. "Got to see Dianne for a letter, visit Henry again to get his letter for his mama, see 'Chonne 'n her kids 'fore they head back to Alexandria."

"After brunch then?" Raul asks hopefully.

"Give ya 'til ten."

Raul sighs. Enid smiles sympathetically. "I'll come with the mail boat in June. If nothing major's going on at the Hilltop health wise. Veronica's baby has to be born by then."

They eat and talk some more, and then they hang out on the porch of the mansion while the kids play, until it's time for bed.

Daryl's been so distracted with old friends at the Hilltop today that he hasn't really had time to miss Carol and Sweetheart, but once he's lying in the loft, listening to Hershel's gentle snores, he feels their absence keenly. He just wants to be able to draw Carol back against his chest, nuzzle her neck, murmur a suggestion, feel her squirm, hear her voice, even if just to say, "Not tonight. Maybe tomorrow."

He's glad he got to play with Hershel and hang out with Aaron, to talk with Enid and Jesus and some of the men he used to hunt with, but he's ready to ride back to Oceanside tomorrow and get on that ship to Jamestown.

Little Puck barks at a rat that has dared to run through his barn and chases it out the other side, and Daryl remembers, suddenly, that he misses Dog, too.


	172. Chapter 172

The Jamestown council is shy two members, because Carolyn is at Oceanside and Gunther is incarcerated, but it holds the normally scheduled town hall the next morning. There are far more people than usual gathered in the folding chairs of the council chambers. Carol exchanges a look with Garland, who seems as puzzled by the unusual attendance as she does. He also seems tense, as if he's expecting that this many involved citizens can only spell trouble.

Garland clears his throat. "This town hall is now open," he declares before calling on a gray-haired man in the front row.

The man stands, sweeps his fisherman's cap off his head, and holds it in his left hand. "I've heard tell Edgar was peeping on our women months ago." There are some nods and murmurs from the other men in the chairs. "That he was – excuse my language, ladies - jerking off in the bushes while he watched them bathe." More murmurs from the chairs. "What I want to know – and what a lot of us here want to know – is why we _didn't_ know. Why wasn't the public informed the day this peeping happened? He could have preyed on one of our daughters, one of our sisters, one of our wives!"

There's a "Damn right!" from someone in the chairs, and a "We should have known," and a "You tell 'em, Joey!"

Deputy Thomas looks nervously at Carol, as though to ask, "You want to take this?" Carol doesn't want to take this, but she does. "The rumors you're hearing are correct. Edgar Meadows did commit the act you describe, for which he was apprehended, arrested, and charged. He plead guilty to voyeurism and public indecency and settled out of court for the full fine required by law. He received a first strike on his record. As a condition of his speedy settlement, the act was not made public."

"Well fuck that!" a man shouts from the back row, a farmer, who looks like he's come straight from the fields for the meeting. "We had a rapist in our midst, walking around _my_ teenage girl, and the sheriff's department didn't tell us?"

"The sheriff's department," Carol says, "didn't know he would escalate to rape, and we were monitoring Edgar and were pre – "

"- Well you weren't monitoring him very damn well, were you?" a man standing in the back yells. A heavy toolbelt rests around the waist of his thick, dark blue jeans. "Y'all didn't keep him from attacking Candy!"

"Damn right!" another man chimes in.

Carol swallows. She still feels guilty for not doing more back then, even if there wasn't much she could have done. "The court didn't know Edgar was such a threat," she explains. "It was his first conviction. The crime was a misdemeanor. If we cracked down heavily on anyone who ever committed a misdemeanor, I think there are a couple of you here who would not like the consequences." She recognizes two men with misdemeanors on their records – one for public drunkenness, and one for brawling. They shift uncomfortably in their chairs.

The gray-haired fisherman looks at one of the shifters, who is no doubt his friend. "I'm not saying the court was too lenient. I'm saying the act should have been made public. We could have been on guard for our women."

Deputy Thomas leans forward somewhat nervously. "It was also thought it would be an embarrassment to the women if it was made public, and that it would make them feel violated and – "

"-They were violated!" the man with the toolbelt shouts.

"Yes," Thomas agrees. "But…I mean, they didn't _feel_ violated because they didn't _know_. I mean…that's not quite what I mean. I mean, it was thought – " He looks helplessly at Carol.

"What's done is done," Carol says. "Maybe the courts made a mistake with that settlement. Maybe I made mistake by not hauling him straight up to the riverbank when I arrested him to let everyone there know. But the deputies, the prosecutor, the defense, the judge…we did what we thought was right at the time. We're all human beings, and we're capable of mistakes. I understand your concern. The council understands your concern. But the past can't be undone. So let's talk about the future. Do you have a proposal for this council today? Is there something you'd like to see going forward?"

"Yeah," the fisherman says, "I propose the next time someone's caught peeping, it gets made public!"

"Yeah!" the workman agrees, hooking at thumb in his belt. "There oughta be a law that sort of thing goes public!"

"Hell, let's just use those old stocks in the Settlement!" the farmer who called out earlier says. "They're just sitting there, ready and waiting. If it was good enough for the original Jamestown, it's good enough for us. Make that part of the sentence for peeping. Let those pervs stand in those things with their heads and their arms in there for a few hours. Put a sign over them, saying what they done. Then everyone will see and know who they are."

Carol glances at Garland with a raised eyebrow.

"Well," Garland says, "I…I don't know about that. That's a bit -"

"- Why not?" the fisherman interrupts. "They deserve it. Peeping on our women. And it would be a way for us to know. We'd know who to keep our eyes open for around our women."

Carol's not liking this constant refrain of **_our_** _women_. "You know," she ventures, "it might be a good idea for you to encourage _your_ women to keep their _own_ eyes open." Garland makes a noise next to her, a sort of breathy caution. Carol takes the hint. Sometimes it's necessary to tread delicately with some of the citizenry. She sheds the peevish tone in her voice and says, mildly, "I think it would be useful for your wives and daughters and sisters if they could learn to defend _themselves_."

Carol knows not everyone is a fighter. Even in the Kingdom and the Hilltop and Alexandria there were people who stayed behind in times of war, people she wouldn't trust to have her back on the battlefield. But Jamestown has too many such people, especially among its adult women. (At least the kids are being taught marital arts and weapons in school.) They've been behind gates for so long. Some of them didn't even have to fight their way here – they made it under armed Naval escort and never left. Jamestown has always been a large enough community to delegate its fighting to less than thirty percent of its population.

There are only two female deputies in Jamestown, and one of them is Carol. The other, Sarah, is also from the Kingdom. There are two female guards, two female hunters, and, as of recently, one female sailor. But in general, the women farm, fish, sew, wash, garden, cook, teach, and clean – all very important work, but none of it requiring martial skills. "That way they can defends themselves if our gates are ever, for some reason, breached."

"Like they were five years ago," the workman leaning against the wall says. "I lost my sister."

"Exactly," Carol says. "But it would also be good for them to have those skills if they ever encounter someone like Edgar. I'd be happy to offer a free self defense class to any of your wives, sisters, or daughters. If you're genuinely interested in their security, I think you should encourage them to attend. In fact, I'll hold a class every Tuesday and Thursday evening from here on out, at seven." She never has night patrol on those days, and Daryl can get Sweetheart to bed.

"Carol's a good teacher," Garland offers. "She's been teaching my wife. She's done an excellent job. Shannon's becoming quite the marksman. And Carol's much more patient at teaching her than I ever was when I was trying."

"Two hours a week," Carol says, "by the archery range. We'll start with physical defense maneuvers the first two weeks, then move onto knives, then bows, and eventually firearms."

"Who's gonna pay for all that ammo?" a man asks. "When you get to firearms?"

"I'll save up and contribute some of my own." Carol's offers sends a murmur of surprise among the chairs. "And I'll ask some deputies to help me scavenge some specifically for training purposes, if the council will approve?"

"All in favor?" Garland asks.

"Up to one hundred rounds," Commander Witherspoon says. "I mean, if you happen to stumble on a treasure trove, some of it better go into storage."

"I'm fine with that," Carol says.

All the council members' hands go up.

"It's approved," Garland says.

Another man raises his hand slightly, one who's done some nodding but hasn't called out. "What's the minimum age on this class going to be? Could my fourteen-year-old daughter attend?"

"Absolutely," Carol says.

"What about my 68-year-old mom?" another man asks. "She's not in the best physical condition, but she could shoot a bow probably. A gun certainly."

"She should attend," Carol assures him. "I'll work with her at her level."

The fisherman looks around at all the men murmuring. "Okay!" he admits. "It's a good offer." He turns back to the council. "But we _still_ want it made public when someone's peeping!"

"Yeah!" the farmer calls. "The stocks!"

Garland raises his hand to quiet them. "The council will take your proposal under advisement. We'll discuss the matter and inform you of our decision tomorrow."

The fisherman nods and sits down.

"Are there any other issues?" Garland asks.

The farmer raises his hand and stands when Garland points to him. "Yeah," he says, "with Gunther in the slammer, that other assistant farm manager has taken over the fields temporarily. I don't like him."

"Do you have an official complaint to lodge?" Garland asks.

"I just don't like him as much as Gunther. He's not as good. And he yells a lot. He's not coaching football out there."

"Well," Garland replies, "unless you have an official complaint to lodge about something he's done that's contrary to the rules, policies, or laws of Jamestown, I guess you'll just have to not like him for the next few days until Gunther gets out."

The farmer grumbles but sits down.

"Hey, I'm in the orchard," another farmer calls over. "I've got that guy _all_ the time now. So you've got no right to complain."

"Anyone else?" Garland asks.

Apparently, the peeping was all they came to talk about. When the council chambers are cleared of citizens, the council discusses the issue raised.

"I think he's got a point about the stocks," Barry says. "Shame is a very effective tool. I use it in parenting."

"In parenting the daughter who helped her boyfriend steal from the brewhouse?" Commander Witherspoon asks.

"You've never had a child. And you never will. You've got no right to talk."

"I sponsor and orphan," Witherspoon snaps back.

Barry snorts. "You throw money at a kid and take him trick-or-treating once a year. Don't pat yourself on your back for your parenting expertise just yet."

"Stop!" Garland barks. "Can you not start something for once, Barry?"

Barry points to himself. "Why are you blaming me? Witherspoon's the one who came at me with the unprovoked insults."

"Somehow, Barry," Garland says, "you always seem to be at the nexus of whatever personal and petty bickering is going on. I have a four-year-old child at home. I don't need this in my council chambers."

" _Your_ council chambers?" Barry asks. He looks around. "Y'all hear that?"

" _Our_ council chambers," Garland clarifies. "I don't want to use the stocks. That strikes me as indecent and draconian. That's not the image we want for Jamestown."

"Why?" Inola asks. "Are we making a brochure for tourists?"

"You're not actually in favor of this, are you?" Garland asks in disbelief.

"It's shocking, I know, that someone could disagree with you, Garland."

"What's that mean?" Garland asks.

Inola shakes her head. "Nothing. Never mind."

"No," Garland insists, "If you have a problem with me, by all means address it directly."

"You _do_ have a tendency to rush through meetings," Dr. Ahmad tells him. "And to just assume agreement until someone stops you and says otherwise."

"I'm trying to be efficient and stay on task."

"I understand that," Dr. Ahmad replies. "But there's a give and take that should come from meetings that we don't always get here. It's just go-go-go with you, Garland."

"Fine." Garland waves his hands out. "What is your opinion on the matter, doctor?"

"I'm against the use of stocks."

"That's it?"

Dr. Ahmad shrugs. "Pretty much."

"Thomas?" Garland asks.

"I don't know. It does seem a little…old school, but so is life now, in a lot of ways. We wouldn't do it all day. Just a couple hours. It would be a cheap punishment. It doesn't cost anything to put someone in the stocks. No need to feed them like when you keep them in jail all day long. It could serve as a deterrent, seeing that. And whoever gets in the stocks probably won't want to be in there again. It could be really effective."

"People will be coming by and throwing tomatoes!" Garland protests.

"No one's going to waste perfectly good food that way," Inola assures him.

"Well, taunting or mocking, then," Garland says. "It will create a climate that encourages hostility and lack of civilized behavior from ordinary citizens. I don't care for it."

"How about you Carol?" Inola asks.

"I'm not in favor of the stocks, but I do think maybe we should agree to post misdemeanor convictions for voyeurism and similar lewd conduct outside the council chambers if they occur in the future. But I wouldn't do it for _every_ misdemeanor. People make mistakes. They need second chances. A clean slate. Especially our _youth_." She glances at Barry when she says that.

"Agreed," Barry says. "Actually, I wouldn't even publicly post convictions for voyeurism. Edgar's a complete fluke. Not everyone who jerks off in the bushes is a _rapist_."

"But we need to do something to appease these people," Inola reasons. "They're very upset they didn't know."

"Witherspoon?" Garland asks. "You haven't offered an opinion."

"I pretty much agree with Carol on this one. But how many convictions have we had for voyeurism or lewd conduct, anyway?"

"Two since the new government formed, including Edgar," Thomas says.

"So it's largely a non-issue?" Witherspoon asks.

"Not to those people who were grumbling here today," Inola says. "And I understand why they're mad. I was in Edgar's room alone with him to repair something four weeks ago. The idea creeps me out now. If I'd known he had a voyeur conviction, I don't think I'd have closed the door on us. I'd have had him wait outside."

"You're still working?" Barry asks. " _That_ pregnant?"

"I can handle minor repairs. I'm not climbing up on roofs!"

"Could we agree to publishing the names of anyone convicted of voyeurism or a similar sexual misdemeanor going forward?" Garland asks. "All in favor?"

Everyone raises a hand.

"And all in favor of adding stocks to the minimum sentence for voyeurism?"

Thomas, Inola, and Barry raise their hands.

"A vote of five council members is necessary to change a minimum sentence," Garland says. "So, we'll vote gain when Gunther and Carolyn are back with us."

After the meeting, Garland follows Carol out and walks with her toward the docks. "You have patrol next?"

"Yes. I'm keeping busy," she tells him. "Seven-hour shift. Otherwise I'm going to start really missing Daryl."

They walk silently for a bit, and then he says, "You handled that well. The town hall. I wasn't sure how that was going to go. You're really going to commit to those classes? Two hours a week, for free?"

"I think I can get Sarah to help."

"I'll help."

"No," Carol says. "You've got too much on your plate, and, besides, some of these women might be more comfortable with female instructors."

Garland nods. "Understood. If you end up having a big turn out, ask Rebekah to help you, too. She's a farmer, because she has talents there, but she studied Krav Maga. She helped fight back the raiders five years ago. She killed two of them. One with her bare hands."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"I should have organized something like this myself years ago. We rely on too specialized a force for soldiers. We can do it because we're large, but who knows what the future holds. Every adult should be capable of fighting if necessary. We should have a true militia of the people."

"Well, that's why I pushed to expand the marital arts and weapons program down to the lower school and make a C the minimum grade for passing those classes in the upper school."

"You were wise to do that. We should have done _that_ sooner, too. You'll make a good mayor."

"What?" Carol asks with a laugh.

"When you decide to run." Garland smiles slightly. "Whenever that may be."

[*]

There's a scratching sound at the door, probably some stray twig blown by the strong wind, clawing across the door and then drifting on. But it makes Sweetheart look up from her wooden puzzle with the giant shapes. She turns where she sits on the bearskin run and looks at the door. "Dada! Dada!"

Dog barks and runs to the door and looks up at the handle.

"No, Sweetie, sorry. Daddy won't be home tonight," Carol tells her as she turns a page in her book. "He'll probably be home the day after tomorrow. It depends how fast his ship goes."

Sweetheart turns back to Carol and pouts. "Dada! Now!"

"Not now, Sweetie." Carol folds back a corner of her book and tosses it on the wicker coffee table. She slides on the floor and picks up the red square by its handle. "Square," she says. "Where's it go?"

Dog returns to his spot beside the toddler and whimpers as he lies down.

Sweetheart grabs the square from Carol and slams it down on the open cut-out shaped like a rectangle. When it doesn't fit, she slams it down again. "Go! Go now!"

Carol puts her hand on top of Sweetheart's and gently guides it over the open square. Sweetheart pushes, and it clicks perfectly into place. "See," Carol says. "It fits! The square fits."

"Yay! Yay! FFFit!"

"That's right, _fit_!" That's another one for the book.

Sweetheart claps, and Carol smiles and wishes Daryl were home to hear her latest word.


	173. Chapter 173

Carol clicks the key in the lock of the jail cell door. She brought Gunther dinner, played some checkers with him, took him for a walk, and now he's back in his cage for the evening. He suddenly smiles, and Carol's wondering why when a pair of arms surrounds her from behind and lightly chapped lips press down on her neck. She startles, but then Daryl's gravelly voice soothes her ear: "Missed ya."

Carol turns in his arms, throws hers around his neck, and kisses him eagerly. He puts one hand on her ass and pushes her closer, urging his tongue inside.

"Get a room!" Gunther says, and Daryl, suddenly reminded of the company, pulls back.

He steps sideways to face the cell bars. "Heard 'bout yer verdict when I got in. Sorry, man."

"The sentence could have been a lot worse. I only have two more days in here. And then I lose some rations for a while. That's it."

Carol lays a hand on Daryl's wrist to regain his attention. "I wasn't expecting you home until tomorrow at the earliest." Carol says.

"Good winds both ways. 'S the baby?"

"She's at the Barons."

"Did Dianne send me a letter?" Gunther asks anxiously.

"Nah," Daryl tells Gunther. "Didn't send a letter."

Gunther bites his bottom lip, swallows, and looks away into the adjoining cell. Carol feels a sudden wave of pity for him, but then Daryl says, "Sent 'erself."

"What?" Gunther asks.

Daryl jerks his head toward the open doorway, and Dianne strolls in, bow and quiver on her shoulder. She smiles ever so slightly.

Relief, happiness, and surprise mingles itself in the huff of a laugh Gunther lets out. "You're here? _How_?"

"How?" she asks drolly. "I came on the ship of course. Cyndie's not thrilled I'll be gone so long, but I promised I'd return with the next mailboat."

Gunther seizes the bars of the cell door. "You're here for a whole month?"

Dianne puts her hands over his through the bars. "I figured I could find some way to earn my keep while I'm here. And I thought you might let me crash in your dorm room."

"Of course!"

"The first two days without you, though, I suppose, since you still have two days to serve in jail?"

"So you know I was convicted of voluntary manslaughter?" he asks.

She nods.

"And…that hasn't changed how you feel about me?"

"I'd have killed the man, too," Dianne replies. She lets her hands slide from his and steps back. "I just wouldn't have done it in public. And I never would have been caught."

Gunther raises an eyebrow. "Remind me not to cross you."

Dianne smirks.

Carol steps forward with the key, clicks it in the lock, and swings open the cell door. "Forty minutes," she tells Gunther. "And don't leave this jailhouse."

"Thank you," he murmurs, and steps quickly forward to embrace Dianne.

Daryl is already out the door. Carol follows him and swings shut the outer, wooden door of the jailhouse behind them.

"That's not strictly regulation," she says. "A deputy is supposed to stay and stand guard if he has a visitor."

"Don't think ya wanna be a fly on that wall."

"No." She laces her arm through his and kisses his shoulder. "I really missed you, Pookie. So did Sweetheart. And Dog."

Santiago is rapidly approaching them. Carol slides her arm out of Daryl's and fishes the notebook out of her front pocket to hand to the deputy. "Nothing interesting on my rounds today," she tells Santiago as he accepts the little book and slides it into his front shirt pocket. "Wait forty minutes to go in the jailhouse, and then lock Gunther back in."

"He's out?"

"Dianne's here."

"Where's Raul?" he asks Daryl anxiously. "Clearly the ship's in, but I can't find him anywhere."

"Uh…'s comin back in June. On the speedboat. With the next mail run."

Santiago rips off his brown cattleman's hat and slaps it against his leg. "You told me you'd make sure he came back to Jamestown. You said – "

"-Tried," Daryl interrupts. "Tried to convince 'em, but he's a grown ass man. Whatya want me to do? Knock 'em out and drag 'em to Oceanside 'n then drag 'em on the ship?"

"What about all his stuff? Is he coming to get it?"

"He ain't _movin'_. Told ya he's comin' back in a month."

"Oh, you really believe that?" Santiago asks. He settles his hat back on his head.

"Yeah, 'cause Enid's comin' with 'em. For a month. Then goin' back on the July speedboat. She wants to study Dr. Ahmad's medical books, ask 'em questions, learn a bit more from 'em. And Raul, he's studyin' under 'er at the Hilltop. Learnin' to be a doctor while he's there."

"That kid is a jack of all trades," Santiago says a little proudly. "I guess he's got to decide which one he wants to become a real master of."

"Maybe he don't have to settle on one. Could get good at 'em all." He's already the best apothecary they have.

Santiago sighs. "I think I'm just afraid of losing him to the Hilltop for good…so soon after I found him again. He's happy, though. Far happier than he was when he got here."

Daryl reaches inside his leather vest and pulls a folded paper out of the inside pocket. "He sent ya a letter."

Santiago takes it, tips it to them like a hat, and says, "Y'all have a good evening."

[*]

When they get to the Barron cabin, Carol knocks and gets a cry of "Come in!" from Shannon. She's lounging on the couch reading while Gary and Garland play checkers at the kitchen table. VanDaryl and Sweetheart sit on the deer skin rug playing with the shape sorter, Sweetheart with her back to her entering parents. She's trying to cram the cylinder into the star opening and ordering it to "Go! Go! Go now!"

VanDaryl leans forward, seizes the wooden shape sorter box, and turns it over. With surprising coordination for such a young toddler, especially one that's still not talking, he pulls the cylinder from Sweetheart's hand and slides it quietly into the correct opening. It clatters inside, and Sweetheart claps.

"Hey, baby girl," Daryl says.

Sweetheart's little hands freeze mid-clap. She gasps. She swivels her body in place where she sits, like she's doing a stretch, and her eyes widen. "Dada!" She rolls over quickly on her hands and knees, pushes up, and scrambles to her feet. "Dada! Dada! Dada!" she cries as she clumsily runs to him. Daryl sweeps her up, legs swinging, as she laughs. He squeezes her tightly against his chest and peppers her cheeks with kisses until she squeals and jerks her head back. "Daa-da!" she scolds.

"Missed ya, sweet pea."

Sweetheart puts a hand on each of his cheeks and looks him in the eyes. Then she turns his face, leans in, and kisses his cheek. The squirm that follows is her signal that she wants down. Daryl sets her on her feet. Content that she has her father home again, she no longer needs his attention, and clomp-runs back over to VanDaryl and plops on her bottom before the sorter.

VanDaryl slides the triangle in, looks up, and raises a reddish-brown eyebrow at her, along with his secretive little smile, as if he's expecting a pleased reaction. He gets one. Sweetheart claps at his accomplishment.

[*]

Daryl breathes in. He licks his lips. His chest rises and falls. "Damn." Carol straightens out the sheet and pulls it up over their naked, slightly damp bodies and settles her head on his shoulder. "Damn," he says again. "Should go on trips more often if this is the greetin' I get when I come home."

"Don't." She kisses his bare shoulder.

"I mean, _damn_."

She giggles.

He cranes his neck and kisses her. "Love ya."

She smiles. "I love you, too. Thank you for my love letter."

"'S good 'nuff?"

"It was perfect." She traces a pattern on the sinews of his chest with a single fingertip. "Garland thinks I'd make a good mayor."

He sighs.

"You don't?"

"'Course I do. Just seen how damn much he works. 'N we got the baby now. She's into everything."

"I don't mean I'd run _this_ July. I haven't even been on the council a full term. But he got me thinking seriously about it. How would you feel if…maybe… _next_ July I threw my hat in the ring? Sweetheart would be almost two and a half. She's already almost completely potty trained. And she's weaned."

Daryl toys with the hair that curls onto her neck. "Ain't like 'em gonna stop ya."

"I value your input, Daryl. This is _our_ life. It would affect us as a unit. I realize that. Shannon's been a constant prop to Garland. I'd be putting you in that position."

"Hell, 'em already in that position."

Carol raises her head to peer at him curiously.

"'S what bein' married means, right?" he asks. "Were each other's props."

She smiles. "Yeah, we are. I think we were even before we were married."

He nods. "Should do it. If 's what ya want. I got yer back."

"Thank you. I won't run until next year, if I do. Don't tell anyone I'm thinking about it. I don't want to seem…overly ambitious."

He chuckles. "Never thought I'd share a bed with a conniving politician."

She slaps him playfully. "I'm not _conniving_. Just circumspect." She settles her head back down again and snuggles in.

He wraps both arms around her.

"So, Henry's serious about this pub?" she asks. "It was almost all the talked about in his letter."

"Mhmhm. Looks like he's got a good start on it."

They talk some more, drifting in and out of sleep as they do, like two kids at a slumber party who don't want the night to slip away. But, eventually, it does.


	174. Chapter 174

"How was the slammer?" Barry asks as Gunther sits down at the council table across from him.

"As comfortable and as exciting as you might imagine."

Carol takes a seat next to Gunther as Thomas flips to a clean page in the council minutes notebook and Garland straightens his notes.

"Seemed like you had a parade of visitors," Barry says. "Including one rather fine looking one." He glances at Carol. "I didn't know the Sheriff's Department allowed conjugal visits."

"You're just disappointed your wife doesn't," Carol replies drolly.

Gunther snorts and Barry glowers. "I get plenty of satisfaction at home, thank you very much."

"Let's get down to business," Garland interrupts. "Carol, how was your first self-defense class yesterday?"

"Excellent. Twenty-five women showed up." Carol glances at Gunther. "Including Candy."

"Dianne told me." Gunther nods across the table at Thomas. "She said you convinced Candy to go?"

"Yeah. I know she couldn't do much with that splint, but I figured she could at least watch and listen, you know?"

"Thank you for that," Gunther tells him.

"Dianne helped me to teach," Carol says. "Sarah, too, and I've asked that woman you suggested help me, Garland. She said she will, once a week."

"Good." Garland fills Gunther and Carolyn in on the council's decision to publicly post the names of sexual offenders. "We'll put them on the board outside the council chambers." He tells them of the proposal to put offenders in the stocks, and that three voted in favor. "So we need your votes for a final decision on that."

"I say put the assholes on display," Carolyn replies.

"I can't vote yet," Gunther says. "My rights aren't restored until my hard labor sentence is up in twenty-nine days. But if you just want my _opinion_ , that's a little old school even for me."

"I'm surprised," Barry says. "I thought you of all people would support this after what happened to Candy."

"There's a reason society evolved beyond that sort of thing," Gunther replies. "Publishing the names is enough to notify the public. Besides, not everyone who gets arrested for public indecency is a threat. If we had this in place years ago, Dante would have been in the stocks."

"He was drunk and streaking," Inola says defensively. "He didn't hurt anyone."

"Neither did Edgar, the first time he was arrested," Gunther says.

"Do _not_ compare my husband to Edgar!"

"I'm not!" Gunther insists. "My point is this law could sweep up perfectly harmless people in its harsh humiliation."

"Well, I didn't think we were proposing to do it for drunken _streaking_ ," Inola replies. "I thought we meant it for voyeurism, groping, repeated lewd harassment…that sort of thing."

"Then those two young teenage boys who peeped through the window of the whorehut to get their first glimpse of a naked lady five years ago would be in the stocks," Gunther reasons. "And they both turned out okay. More or less. But after hours of public ridicule, I'm not so sure they _would_ have turned out okay."

"Fair point," Carolyn says. "I didn't think of that. But the stocks could be an _option_. To be administered on a case by case basis."

"Left to the discretion of the jury?" Garland asks. When Carolyn nods, Garland says, "All in favor of allowing the stocks as an _option_ for punishment, at the discretion of the jury?"

Thomas, Carolyn, and Barry raise their hands. This time Inola doesn't support the stocks, even at the jury's discretion. Gunther's words have given her pause. It probably hadn't occurred to her that someone like Dante might end up in them.

"Then there's not enough to carry the motion," Garland says. "Let's consider it declined. Next order of business: Dianne needs to earn her keep for the month. I suggest we put her on guard duty ten hours a week and the fields ten hours a week."

"I'm not sure she wants me to be her boss," Gunther says.

"Then put her in the orchard," Carol suggests. "Under the other assistant farm manager."

"God, no," Gunther replies. "Brian will just hit on her all week. Fine, we'll put her in the fields. She's strong, she'll do well at the work. I'll just try not to be too bossy."

"Not her fetish, huh?" Barry asks. "I would guess not. She really seems more like a dom than a sub."

"Don't _make_ me come over there."

"You don't want a third strike from another assault charge," Barry warns him. "I'm immune from you."

"But not from me, you're not," Carol tells him. "I'll happily pay the fine."

Thomas whistles and Inola laughs.

"You don't have the strength," Barry tells her. "You're not scary without a weapon. And I really don't think you're going to shank me for a joke."

"Barry," Garland says in that forced, thin, calm tone he uses when he's two steps from losing his temper, "stick to business or I'll eject you from these council chambers."

"She's the one who threatened me!"

"All in favor of assigning Dianne to guard duty for ten hours and the field for ten hours while she's here?" All hands go up and Garland moves on. "I've been communicating with all the leaders of the Alliance. Michonne says she's putting together a team of engineers, led by Eugene Porter, to design and build batteries, so that when that speedboat battery finally fails in a year or so, we'll have a replacement."

"Do they really think they can do it?" Witherspoon asks.

"They do, though it's going to take some time and experimenting. They also plan to build battery back-ups for the solar systems in Alexandria and here at the museum, and maybe extend them to parts of Oceanside and the Hilltop if those communities can scavenge their own solar panels and wires."

"Would we be able to expand our power one day?" Thomas asks with excitement. "To the cabins?"

"I don't know about that. If so, that's a long way off," Garland says. "Materials are scarce. Which is why they want us to contribute to the battery design project by mining lithium from the salt ponds in Hampton. They're closest to us. Forty miles southeast."

"Why should _we_ do the grunt work?" Barry asks.

"Because the Hilltop and Oceanside are both contributing engineers to the team, and we need to contribute something," Garland replies. "And we have a former salt miner - Davin Smith. We've got him with the builders – "

"- Oh, one of _yours_ , finally," Gunther says to Inola with a smile.

"He can head the mining team," Garland continues. "We're going to need to do this primitively. The Hilltop has sent us _A Key to Our Future_ to use for instructions."

"I don't know," Inola says. "That sounds like a lot of work just on the off _chance_ they're able to build batteries we can all use."

"I agree," Carolyn says. "And a lot of people. We'll need a team of miners, and we'll need sailors for the crew, and also need guards to watch the area and kill cannibals while the minors are working."

"The sailors can double as guards," Witherspoon reasons.

"We're talking hours of work we'll have to pay our people rations for," Carolyn says, "and for what? A hope?"

"These batteries will keep the speedboat running," Gunther says, "Keep the post running. Keep our communities in contact."

"Let you see your girlfriend more often, you mean?" Barry asks.

"Our solar storage batteries are going to die within two years," Dr. Ahmad adds. "We'll have no backup emergency power if we can't find a way to replace them."

"We could combine the mining trip with a fishing trip," Witherspoon suggests. "We can sail down river to get to Hampton, and then round the peninsula. That will mean fishing in the Bay. More and different fish than in the river. And there may be good crabbing there. We'll come back with a lot more than just lithium."

"We could send some deputies to scavenge, too," Thomas suggests. "There was a migrating herd that kept us from scavenging Newport News years ago, but that herd was in movement. It's certainly moved on by now. That's one spot we've never scavenged. We may find something."

"How long would that take, and how would you bring it back?" Carolyn asks.

"The town's only fifteen miles from those salt ponds," Deputy Thomas replies. "And we can fit two horses and a cart on that ship."

"We're talking a lot of people, now," Carolyn says. "And horses?"

"We always take horses scavenging," Thomas reasons.

"How long would this trip be?" Inola asks.

"About six hours to sail there," Witherspoon replies. "Six hours back."

"I've spoken to Davin," Garland says. "He thinks three days to dig evaporation ponds and get the brine in them. Then it will have to evaporate over a few months, and we'll go back – "

"- Oh, now we're talking two trips?" Carolyn asks.

"We'd need to go back before the freeze," Garland says. "To get it it, yes."

Carolyn shakes her head.

"It's an expensive mission," Carol agrees, "But there are a lot of gains to be made. Shoring up our alliance by cooperating. Possibly getting batteries out of this in a year. Fish, crab, and maybe ammo."

"All the gun stores were likely scavenged years ago at the start," Carolyn says.

"But not _all_ the houses. Not every one of them," Thomas reasons.

"Three days we'll have to go house to house," Carol says. "In southern Virginia. We're bound to find something."

"Are you volunteering to scavenge?" Carolyn asks.

"If I'm needed," Carol says firmly.

"I'll go, too," Thomas says. "I've been itching for some adventure. So have Santiago and Sarah. The three of us were talking about heading out soon locally anyway. And this is a good time for Santiago to get out, what with Raul not being around."

"Captain McBride just got back from sailing," Carolyn says. "Is he going to want to go right back out?"

"It's his _job_ ," Dr. Ahmad reasons.

"I'll captain that ship, if Captain McBride doesn't want to," Witherspoon says. "Weather's fair for sailing. May winds. If we're doing this, we should do it soon. I say we get together a crew and a team and leave in ten days."

"All in favor?" Garland asks. "No one has to go who doesn't want to."

Carol raises hers, followed quickly by Thomas, Witherspoon, and Dr. Ahmad. Inola looks around at the raised hands and raises hers. "If I were voting," Gunther says, "which I'm not, but if I were, my hand would be up."

Garland looks at Carolyn. "The charter requires a unanimous vote to approve sending a ship more than twenty miles from base."

Carolyn sighs. "You're all bunch of big spenders," she says. "It's going to catch up with us one day." But she raises her hand.

[*]

Daryl, his foot on his crossbow on the floor of the cabin, jerks it cocked with an angry pull. "Seriously? I _just_ got home!"

"Why are you cocking that in the house?" Carol asks.

"Testin' it. Just put on new strings." He flings open the cabin door and shoots a bolt through the settlement until it lodges in a tree several yards away.

"Hey!" some woman shouts. "That's dangerous! Don't be doing that around the cabins!"

"Ain't dangerous if ya got good aim!" Daryl shouts back. Then he hollers, "Hey, kid! Bring me m' bolt!"

When he comes back inside later, he's sliding the bolt back into the quiver. He shuts the door and hangs the uncokced crossbow on the back of it. Carol dishes the stew into two bowls. Sweetheart has already been fed and is sitting on the bearskin rug, earnestly working with the shape sorter the Barrons let her borrow. She's figured out, now, that she can't force the shapes to obey her will, and she's sliding them into the proper spots, with some effort. Dog is helping by picking up shapes from the floor in his mouth and dropping them in her hand.

"How long ya gonna be gone?" Daryl asks as he sits down at the table.

Carol sets a bowl in front of him and one in front of herself before sitting. "No longer than you were. Less, actually. Three and a half days."

Daryl picks up his spoon. "Go with ya."

"Then who's going to watch Sweetheart?"

"Shannon 'n Garland."

"We can't rely on their good will so much," Carol says.

"They like watchin' 'er."

"You need to stay," Carol tells him. "Sweetheart needs her daddy. And then you can have some one-on-one time with her."

"I get plenty of one on one time with 'er when yer on patrol."

"I mean you can see what it's like to handle her completely by yourself for four days straight. Maybe develop a little more appreciation for what I do around here."

"'Preciate the hell out of ya," Daryl says. "'N I thought ya said three days, not four."

"Three and a half." Carol takes a bite and then rests her spoon in her bowl. "Daryl, it's important to me to do this. If I want to run for mayor someday, I need to be seen to be participating in some of these missions."

"'N then when yer mayor, ya ain't goin' out so much, right? Like Garland? He sits his ass inside the gates almost all the time now."

"Is that what you want?" Carol asks. "For me to _sit my ass_ inside the gates? Be your little woman at home?"

"Ain't what I said. Don't put words in m'mouth."

"You go outside those gates almost every day to hunt. I need to stay in shape."

"Yer in great shape. Yer gorgeous."

Carol smiles. "That's not what I meant and you know it. I need to expose myself to walkers more often. I can't let myself get soft. I need to get out there and clear some houses with the boys."

"Yeah? What boys?"

"The best-looking ones of course," she teases.

He glowers.

"Thomas. Santiago. Sarah, too."

"Sarah's a damn pretty boy."

Carol chuckles.

"Whose gonna be on patrol, with all the deputies out there?"

"Sherriff Earl will be here," Carol answers. "Deputy Andrew. The apprentice just got formally deputized. Jake."

"Just missed ya is all, when I was gone. 'N I _just_ got home."

"We aren't leaving for nine or ten days," she assures him. "And I won't be gone for more than four."

"Ya said three."

"Three and a half. And when did you become so _settled_?"

"I ain't. 'S why I wanna go _with_ ya."

"But you'd be content if I didn't go at all and we both stayed here?"

He shrugs. "Yeah."

"You're settled."

"Well, took a good woman to convince me to do it." Daryl fishes in his soup and comes up with a radish.

They eat quietly for a while, and then Carol says, "It's not that I don't want you with me. It's that we both left Sweetheart without a parent for eight days in November, and it almost broke my heart. I'd feel better if I knew her _father_ was with her. She's _ours_. Not the Barrons'. And I don't want her to lose sight of that fact. They're her godparents, and they love her. And she's blessed to have them. But _we're_ her parents."

"I get it," Daryl murmurs. He drains the last of his glass of water and sets it down with a slightly lecherous smile. "So, uh…when ya get back from this trip? Yer gonna have missed me, right?"

Carol smiles back. "There might be a vigorous reunion in store for us, yes."

"Sweetie," he calls, "wanna spend four days with just daddy? Take ya huntin'!"

"Dada!" Sweetheart squeals and points to him. "Dada! Dada!"

"You are _not_ taking her hunting," Carol says. "At 17 months."

"Be 18 months in ten days."

Carol gives him a look over her water glass.

He smirks. "'M kiddin'. Ain't takin' 'er huntin'. _Yet._ Gonna take 'er on a nature walk, though. Inside the gates. Show 'er a thing or two."

"She'd love that. You're a good daddy."

"'M tryin'."

"You're succeeding."

Sweetheart toddle-runs over and slams herself against Daryl's side. He puts an arm around her and gives her a squeeze. She holds up the shape in her hand. "Ware!"

"That's right!" Carol says in surprise. "It's a square!"

Daryl takes the wooden, yellow square from Sweetheart's hand. "Told ya. Our girl's a genius."


	175. Chapter 175

_**A/N:** _I may be slow to update going forward. Just a heads up so you don't think I fell off the face of the earth. Things are just getting busy in terms of work and home.

[*]

Carol keeps telling Daryl shit he already knows. Where the extra sheets are when Sweetheart wets the bed. Where the book is for writing down any new words she says. What the toddler can't eat without choking and how her food has to be prepared to prevent that. What times Shannon can watch her if he's working and what times she can't and when the daycare is open. What stuffies the girl needs to sleep with. How to nip her temper tantrums in the bud. Like he doesn't know. Like he didn't manage to feed a newborn baby in a prison after a walker attack when the mother was dead and there was no formula anywhere nearby.

"Relax!" he mutters. "Got this. I read the damn book." He's onto _What to Expect the Second Year_ now. He couldn't find _What to Expect the Third Year_ , if there even is such a thing, so he's on his own after Sweetheart's second birthday, he supposes.

Carol sighs. "Sorry. I just -"

"- Yer only gonna be gone three days."

"Three and a half."

"Ya left 'er for eight days before."

"Yeah but that was w – " Carol stops suddenly.

Daryl narrows his eyes. "What were ya gonna say? That was with Shannon? 'N ya can trust Shannon with the baby more than ya can trust _me_?"

"No."

"Mhmhm."

"I _trust_ you with the baby, Daryl. I just feel guilty about leaving her."

"She's with 'er daddy. Gonna be fine."

"You're a good daddy." Carol steps forward and wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him. His grumpiness dissolves and his ruffled feathers are soothed by the feel of her fingers raking through his hair. He could stay here all morning, savoring these sweet kisses of hers, but she eventually pulls away and puts her backpack on.

"Have fun on yer vacation." He smirks. "Bring me a t-shirt."

"This is a _working_ trip," she reminds him. "I'm scavenging the whole time."

Carol says her goodbyes to Sweetheart, with a long hug, and then Daryl walks her to the door. "Careful out there," he tells her. "If ya run into more than three walkers at once, 'member, two knife twist is – "

"- I know."

"Yeah. Annoyin', ain't it, when someone tells ya shit ya already know?"

Carol smiles. "I'm sorry." She pats his cheek. "Have fun, Pookie. And thank you for holding down the fort." She waves to Santiago and Sarah, who, packs on their back, are headed toward the docks. They pause and wait for her. Daryl shuts the door behind her when she walks off toward them.

He turns to Sweetheart to tell her daddy has the day off and they're going to have a good time, but she's vanished. He scours the cabin but doesn't see her anywhere. It's a _one-room_ cabin. It's not that big. Where could she have gone? The drape is pulled around their bedroom. He jerks it back, but she's not there. "Sweetheart!" he calls. Nothing.

He walk around the wood stove and countertop to look behind it. Nothing. "Sweetheart!" He looks over the iron bars around the fireplace and even up the chimney, though it's not possible she climbed up there. Now he's getting really anxious. "Sweetheart!"

A giggling peel of little girl laughter erupts from behind him. He turns and follows the sound. He bends over and flips up the light blanket that hangs over the edge of the toddler bed in her room and finds her lying on the floor beneath the bed, wedged in with he back against the boxes stored beneath. "Get out here!" he growls as he gets down on his hands and knees and drags her out by her arm. The giggling continues as he sets her on her feet.

Daryl forces down the instinctive anger that rises up in him. She's just a little girl. She was just playing. And he was just scared for a second. He's not mad, he's scared, and fear comes out as anger in Dixon boys. He has to _tell_ himself all that, though, and he feels guilty that he does, that he's not just naturally patient and gentle, like Garland seems to be with his boys. He's working against an upbringing that taught him every wrong way to parent. But he's damn well _going_ to work against it.

"Dada, Weeite bye bye!"

"Yeah, Sweetie went bye bye." Daryl hugs her. "Gave daddy a scare." He pulls back. "Don't do it again, a'right?"

Daryl stands from where's he's crouched and begins to look for her shoes so they can go for that nature walk he promised her. It occurs to him, suddenly, that she just said her first _three-word_ sentence. He's got to write that in the book for Carol. He walks over to the bookcase, but he doesn't see the baby book anywhere.

Now _where_ did Carol say she kept it again?

[*]

Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado is showing Carol the ropes – quite literally. The crew of the _Gospeed_ is a little short-staffed for this sailing jaunt. There were considerably more excited applicants when there was an island full of women at the end of the river.

"You're a natural at this," the lieutenant says as he steps back and looks up at the sails that are now beautifully catching the wind. Commander Witherspoon has the wheel, and Ensign Harry Merriweather is on board, along with three seamen. That's it for a crew, so some of the fisherman – including Marcus, who piloted the speed boat when they first seized it – are lending a hand. Fortunately, with the winds being what they are, and the short distance, they don't expect to spend more than five hours sailing before they drop anchor.

"Maybe I missed my calling," Carol says.

Carlos laughs. "Well, you can always ask for a reassignment…though you'll have to start as a seaman apprentice and work your way up the ranks."

"Not sure I want to step down from deputy just yet."

He leans back against a barrel rail. "Rumor is you're angling for Earl's job. Or Garland's."

"No one's taking Garland's job," she answers evasively. "He's simply going to run up against the term limits."

"Does that mean you are or are not running for mayor in the next one to two years?"

"It means someone's running for mayor other than Garland."

"Well you're as vague as Michonne," he replies. "Not willing to be pinned down, hmm?"

Carol smiles sympathetically. "She lost the love of her life. That's not easy to bounce back from."

"Do you know that from personal experience?"

Carol shakes her head. "No. Daryl's the love of my life, and, God willing, we'll have another thirty years together."

"Fifty years, surely. You can't be more than thirty-nine."

Carol laughs. "I see why Michonne likes you. Keep that charm up, and, who knows, you may make a dent in that armor of hers."

"Well, in the meantime, I'm enjoying chinking away." Carlos furrows his brow. "That wasn't inadvertently vulgar was it?"

"No. Just not a very good metaphor."

The lieutenant is called away, and Carol begins to stroll around the deck, now that she's no longer needed, at the moment, to manage the sails.

[*]

Sweetheart crouches down where the water laps at the shore. She splashes her hand in the murky river and laughs. "Wa!" she says with each slap. "Wa! Wa! Wa!"

"Yep. Water," Daryl agrees. He sits down with his arms draped on his knees and watches her play barefoot at the water's edge. Her shoes sit near by, tiny socks tucked inside. He's taken Gunther's advice to keep her feet clad when they're walking around the village or settlement, but now they're near water, away from the rank of civilization. It's quiet at the moment – except for the cawing of the gulls and the gentle lapping of the river. This is a secret alcove Daryl discovered in one of his walks. No one bathes here, and he's rarely seen anyone fishing.

"Wa wa!" Sweetheart says as she begins to toddle into the river. He watches for a awhile, letting her have her freedom to venture, until she trips and falls flat on her face, and then he rushes to scoop the wailing toddler up.

Daryl gets down on her level, grips her gently by both shoulders, and says. "Yer fine!" Sweetheart stops mid cry and sniffles. Her lip trembles like she's about to cry again, and he repeats, "Yer fine. Just fine."

She seems to accept his verdict on the matter. Either that or she's distracted by a lizard scurrying across the pebbly shore. She gasps, points to it, and takes off running after it. Daryl tears ahead of her and captures the little creature. He confines it, with its head out one end of his cupped hands and the tail out the other, and lowers it down for her to examine. She leans in for a closer look but jerks back when it flicks its tail.

"'S okay. Won't hurt ya. 'S just a little brown skink."

"Stink!"

" _Skink_."

"Weetie's stink!"

"Nah, ya can't eat 'em. He's too small. Ain't worth killin'." The thing's only about four inches long.

"Weetie's stink!"

"Yer skink? What, ya think yer gonna keep 'em as a pet?"

Sweetheart puts a hand on one hip and nods her little head up and down. "Weetie's stink."

Later that afternoon, the little brown skink is in a clear, plastic storage bin in the Dixon family cabin, on top of the chest at the foot of Sweetheart's toddler bed. Holes have been poked in the top of the container, and sticks and rocks and leaves have been scattered across the bottom of the bin to form a habitat. "Dunno if yer mama's gonna like it," Daryl says, "but when I tell 'er were gonna feed 'em all the spiders and roaches we find in the cabin, maybe she'll be a'right with it."

Sweetheart gets down on her knees in front of the makeshift aquarium and peers inside at her pet lizard.

"Gotta name 'em. 'Cause if was up to me, we'd just call 'em lizard."

"Stinkeee!"

Daryl chuckles. "Stinky it is."


	176. Chapter 176

Carol climbs up onto the back of the cart and dangles her legs off the edge, while Thomas hops up beside her. Sarah sits on the bench driver's seat next to Santiago. There's plenty of room for goods, if the four deputies find any. It took a while to get the horses and gear and cart off the ship and hitch everything up, but they're ready to head off into the city to scavenge while the rest of the group mines the salt ponds and fishes and crabs in the nearby bay.

"Hi – ya!" Santiago shouts and cracks the whip. The horses trot forward. Thomas checks the safety on his rifle, and Carol casually removes an arrow from her quiver and lays it atop the compound bow she holds in her hands, ready to load if needed. She half hopes she does. It's been awhile since she's killed any walkers. She could use the target practice.

[*]

"'S almost as good as yer mama's was," Daryl says, pointing to the strawberry pie with his fork.

"You aren't supposed to say _almost_ , Daryl," Shannon tells him. "Almost is not a proper compliment."

"Sorry."

"See what I have to put up with?" Garland asks him. "Imagine how long I have to ruminate on _my_ compliments."

"Oh shush, baby. And I know my pie can't compare to my mother's."

Daryl smiles. He's eating at the Barron's tonight because Shannon is apparently under the impression he can't fend for himself in Carol's absence. He's not going to tell her he cooks dinner two to three nights a week when Carol's on patrol, or that he's prepared his own meals – such as they were – since he was five. His mother never made a home-cooked meal. Everything came out of boxes and cans, if she put anything on the table at all. There's something nice about having a woman cook for him, whether it's his wife or his friend. He doesn't _need_ it, of course, but he doesn't think he'll ever get tired of it either.

Sweetheart is sitting in Garland's armchair, with the shape sorter box between her legs. VanDaryl toddles over from the pile of shapes on the deerskin rug and hands her one.

"'S really walkin' now," Daryl says.

"He just suddenly took off, out of the blue," Shannon tells him. "And I almost wish he hadn't. He's into everything now. And he's so sneaky. So quiet. I was fixing dinner yesterday, and I didn't even see he'd pulled out all the books on the first two shelves of the bookcase until he started trying to _climb_ it. The weight was off, and he could have pulled that whole thing down on himself if I hadn't stopped him." She shakes her head. "I used to worry about cannibals, but now I have to worry about bookcases!"

"No!" Sweetheart tells VanDaryl as he tries to take the shape sorter box. "Weetie's!"

VanDaryl seems unfazed by her scolding. He turns away and stumble-runs over to Gary, who is playing with the matchbox car garage he got for his birthday. VanDaryl seizes a car as it begins to roll down the ramp and hands it to Gary like he's being helpful. Gary sighs, takes the car, and sets it atop the ramp again. He gives it a little push. Again VanDaryl catches it before it can get halfway down the ramp.

"Daaaady!" Gary whines. "Tell VanDee to stop!"

"Stop, VanDaryl," Garland says noncommittally.

VanDaryl drops the car on top of the garage, runs over to Daryl, stops with a hand on his knee, and looks up at him.

"Ya want up?" Daryl asks.

VanDaryl points his finger up, so Daryl lifts him into his lap, and VanDaryl promptly seizes the last bit of the pie on his plate and shoves it in his mouth.

[*]

Santiago rears the horses to a stop as they round a curve in the road. A small group of ambling walkers blocks the way leading to town. Carol leaps off the back of the cart and runs to the front while loading an arrow. She leaves a slumbering Thomas, hat over his face, behind. Sarah jumps off the driver's bench and flanks her, and they march forward, twin arrows soaring.

In one smooth motion, Carol slides another arrow from her quiver and loads. She pulls back the string and the bolt flies through the air and penetrates the forehead of another walker. A few feet from her, Sarah does the same. Arrows _woosh, woosh, woosh_ through the hot, early June evening air as the women destroy the pack.

Arrows exhausted, Carol drops her bow to the ground and slides her fingers through the brass-knuckle grip of her knife. She unsheaths it quickly, stabs one walker, rips the blade out, and then punches back another, which Sarah stabs through the head with an arrow she hasn't had time to load.

Just as the last walker falls, Thomas comes clamoring from around the back of the cart, the bayonet of his rifle poised. He stops suddenly and looks at the fallen bodies. "Well, I guess I slept through all the excitement."

Breathing hard, Sarah gives Carol a small victory nod and then looks back at Santiago, who stands casually with one hand on the reins of a horse and another on the butt of his handgun.

"Thanks for the help, honey," Sarah says drolly.

He smiles. "You seemed like you had it under control. And, besides, you're damn sexy when you're fighting off cannibals."

"At least help me gather my arrows."

"Yes, ma'am." Santiago heads for the nearest walker, which is face down, and slides out an arrow. He begins to clean it with a rag he flicks from his back pocket. "Looks like he's lost his pants."

It happens, sometimes, that the walkers waste away and the pants slide off, and they fall and crawl right out of them, boots still on. But the walker Santiago is dealing with looks too fresh for that, while none of the older-looking walkers have yet lost their britches. Carol puts the toe of her combat boot on the head of pants-free walker to steady the mushy skull as she slides her arrow out. "Come look at this." She points with the arrow below the walker's waist.

Santiago, Sarah, and Thomas stroll over and look down at the half-naked creature and see its been castrated. More than castrated – both the testicles and the penis have been sloppily cut off. " ¡ _ **Dios mío**_!," Santiago murmurs.

"Was the other one like that?" Sarah asks.

Santiago walks back to the walker he was dealing with and rolls it over, face up. He takes in a breath and runs his hand over his mouth, like he's about to vomit. "Same thing here."

Thomas walks between the corpses, counting the damage. He has to roll over one pant-less walker to check. "Six of them have been mutilated that way."

"The mutilated ones are more freshly turned," Carol observes. "Less than a year, surely." Based on the light fall clothes they wear, she'd guess they turned eight months ago. "But the rest of them look four years old, easily."

"The older ones are dressed for winter," Santiago notes. The coats are worn, torn, faded, and muddied on their desiccated frames.

"The newer ones must have herded up with the older ones," Sarah conjectures. "And someone must have castrated them _before_ they were cannibals."

"Who would do such a thing?" Thomas asks. "Why?"

Carol examines the next walker more closely as she recovers her arrow. "I think it's how they died. Left to bleed out after they were castrated."

Santiago examines another corpse and agrees. "No bullet wounds, no other stab wounds."

When the arrows are recovered and clean, the deputies examine the older walkers and find a few loaded magazines in the inside pockets of their coats or clipped to their loose and sagging belts.

Santiago stands and unsheaths a knife he took off a fallen walker. "This would be really nice with a little rust-remover and a good sharpening. But I don't really need another."

"Can I have it?" Thomas asks. "I promised Candy I'd find her a good one, now that she's going to Carol's class."

Santiago slides it back into the sheath. "Sure. But remember ninety percent of what we find goes in the common stores." He smirks. "Of course, as Daryl likes to say, _What don't come back, don't come back_."

"We'll take it out of the ten percent scavenger's fee," Sarah insists. "Three of us are running for council next month. We don't want to look like we're breaking the rules."

" _Three_ of you?" Santiago asks.

"I told you I was mulling it over."

"You didn't tell me you'd _decided_."

"Well, I have. I started collecting my signatures yesterday. I just need one more." Sarah slides a hand in Santiago's back pocket and eases up to him. "Can you sign it for me, sweetheart?"

"Maybe for a kiss."

Sarah presses her lips to his. "No PDA on duty, please," Thomas grumbles.

When Sarah slides away, Santiago says, "I'm not sure we should go any further into town. What if whoever did this is still alive and living here, now that the herd's moved on?"

"Afraid you might lose the family jewels?" Sarah asks.

"You'd miss them, too, mi corazón."

"The sun will set before long," Carol says. "We can't get back to the ponds before nightfall. And we should probably find out if there _is_ a threat nearby, because, if there is, it's not far from Jamestown."

"I suppose it _is_ our job to assess threats," Santiago concedes. "But we better find some place to hole up and eat some dinner before night fall. Maybe a garage where we can shelter the horses and cart. We can scout the town in the morning and sacavenge if it's safe. Retreat and warn the others if it's not."

"We should scout on foot to stay quiet," Carol insists.

"Then someone should guard the horses," Thomas replies. "I'll do it. I'm willing to stay behind."

"Yeah, you and your balls," Santiago mutters.

"Hey, it's not like it's not risky to guard the horses, too."

The deputies switch out drivers. Sarah takes the reins because Santiago wants to have his rifle ready in the event that they encounter anyone with fire power before they find a place to lodge for the night. Carol agrees with that perspective, and she puts her bow on the cart and slaps a 15-round magazine into her AR-15. She makes sure one's in the chamber.

Carol climbs back onto the cart just before Sarah flicks the whip. The horses whinny and the cart creaks forward down the crumbling asphalt and into town.


	177. Chapter 177

On the outskirts of town, the deputies encounter a strip mall. Thomas guards the horses while the other three investigate the CVS. It's been well looted. "Probably at the start," Santiago says.

"Yes," Carol agrees, "but again more recently. Not enough cobwebs."

"Have the ball-cutters been through here, do you think?" he asks.

"Possibly."

There's nothing worth salvaging. Next door is a Domino's pizza delivery place, with one walker bumbling about inside behind the counter. Carol shanks it quickly, and then covers her mouth and nose with her hands. The stench in the place is so foul, they don't even bother to investigate for loot. Everything's spoiled by now, anyway. Instead, they move on to a State Farm insurance agent's office next door, where they find a third of a bottle of whiskey locked in a desk drawer. "That's for all of us tonight," Santiago insists.

Sarah shakes her head.

"What don't come back, don't come back," he reasons.

"Daryl should not be the source of your mantras," Sarah tells him. She shoots Carol an apologetic look. "Not that Daryl doesn't have his insights, but we don't need to be getting buzzed tonight."

Santiago shakes the bottle. "That's _one_ drink each. We won't. And no sense bringing it back."

Sarah shrugs her agreement.

When they come back out, Thomas is looking through binoculars.

"See anything?" Carol asks.

"Looks pretty desolate, but when you're done, I'll climb on the roof."

The team moves on to the next storefront: a Tae Kwon Do studio. No one's bothered with it. They bust open a storage cabinet and find two dozen 18-ounce bottles of water. Santiago unscrews the cap of one, takes a sip, and spews out the water onto a mat. "The chemicals from the plastic have leached in. It's undrinkable."

"You're just not desperate enough," Sarah reasons.

"Oh, there was a time when I would have taken water that tasted this poorly," he agrees. "Before I found Jamestown."

Carol has begun taking the first aid supplies, and Santiago and Sarah grab handfuls, too - gauze, bandages, rubbing alcohol, finger and wrist splints, instant cold packs, and pain killers that may or may not still work. They load it all onto the cart.

The used bookstore nextdoor is untouched, except the open drawer of the cleaned-out cash register. At the start, someone must have thought money would still be worth something. The deputies go book shopping. Carol grabs six books for herself, four for Shannon, two for Garland, and a dozen for Sweetheart and her godsons. She also picks up one for Daryl – _Death in the Long Grass: A Big Game Hunter's Adventures in the African Brush_. She doesn't know if he'll read it. It's creative nonfiction. While he reads a decent number of manuals for practical purposes, she rarely sees him with novels. He'd rather busy himself with fixing things around the cabin, cleaning guns, or sharpening knives. But she figures they out to have something entertaining if he's ever sick and laid up for a day. Not that he stays put when he's sick, either.

When they're done with everything but the gas station at the end of the strip mall, Thomas climbs a fire escape to survey the scene. He returns and reports a few walkers rambling in the streets, but no sign of any large groups or camps. "If whoever did that to those men are still here, they're probably camping in the shipyard, so they can fish. When you go in on foot tomorrow, that's the place to look."

"But we sailed past the shipyard on our way to Hampton," Sarah says. They docked near the salt ponds, and then the deputies backtracked a few miles north. "The lookout didn't mention seeing anything."

"He was watching for pirates on the river," Thomas suggests. "And if there is a camp, it's probably blocked from view by the ships."

"They might have been watching when we sailed by, though," Carol says. "They might know there are people nearby, or at least passing by."

"Shit," Santiago mutters. "If so, they may have some scouts about." He looks around suspiciously.

"If they spied our ship," Sarah reasons, "they're probably shoring up their defenses rather than going out looking for trouble."

"Really?" Thomas asks. "Because we're out looking for trouble."

"We're looking for _threats_ ," Carol qualifies. "And we're reporting back on what we find. It's not as if we plan to engage."

Thomas shakes his head. "Maybe we should just abort and go back to the salt ponds."

"Worried about your cojones?" Santiago asks with a slight smirk.

"You know I've done my share of scouting and fighting. I'm no coward. I'm being _practical_ here."

"We need to know what's here," Carol insists. "That's practical. That shipyard is twenty-five miles by river from our doorstep at Jamestown. I might have said we should find out if they'd make good trade partners, if it weren't for…you know."

Both men wince and tighten their legs.

"There could be a good reason for it," Sarah suggests. "Maybe those men were bandits and raped one or more of the women in their camp. And then they got the upper hand and got their just retribution."

Santiago smiles with mixed affection and trepidation. "Remind me not to cross you, mi amor."

"Maybe they've moved on," Carol says. "That's also possible. I mean, they didn't kill those men. They just let them turn. Why do that if you plan to stay? Why add six more walkers to your environment?"

"I guess we'll find out tomorrow. For now…" Santiago squints up at the setting sun, "Let's check out that gas station garage."

They head to the gas station at the very end of the strip mall, where nozzles dangle from each of the four pumps but the smell of gas no longer lingers after so many years. Dark black stains discolor the fading gray of the asphalt. There's no convenience mart attached to the place, not really - just a busted-in office with a single empty soda refrigerator, a cleaned-out shelf of cigarettes behind the desk, and a narrow rack that probably once contained candy and snacks.

Behind the door that connects the office to the garage, they can hear snarling. There's no window in the door, so they can't guess how many, but it sounds like there are several. "Those can't be just the mechanics for a garage this small," Santiago insists. "Someone trapped a group of walkers in there."

Carol puts her ear to the door and listens to the hum of the walker's song. The door shudders. Two fingers inch under a crack at the bottom. She steps back. "Ten to fifteen, I'd guess. And maybe the garage wasn't looted if there are walkers inside. Let's clear it out."

Once outside the office, Santiago screws a silencer on his rifle while Carol and Sarah load an initial arrow into each of their bows. Thomas draws his knife and reaches for the handle of the garage door. "One," he says, "two…" and then he yanks it up just one-fifth of the way and scurries back, knife poised.

Feet shuffle toward the door, some with torn boots, some barefoot, some clad with intact shoes that are merely coated in dust or mud. The door isn't raised enough for them to walk straight out. Some duck their heads to get under it and bang against the door in their failed attempt. Others drop all the way to the asphalt and, blinking against the rays of the setting sun, drag themselves out on their stomachs. This makes them easy pickings.

Sarah and Carol take out two, reload their arrows, and take out two more. As the women reload, Thomas rushes ahead to stab one that has risen to its feet and stumbled ahead. When he scurries backward again, they send off their arrows. Santiago saves his bullets, ready to provide covering fire if needed, and only letting off a single muted shot at the end, when their arrows are all spent. Most of the arrows have gone straight into the foreheads of walkers, but a few have missed their goals and hit other parts of the walkers as they crawled over one another.

By the time the creatures stop crawling out, there's a pile of thirteen bodies on the asphalt. Thomas bangs loudly on the garage door and scurries back. They wait three more minutes before rolling it all the way up.

A single rusted car sits on a lift. A few cans of oil and gas and some tools have been knocked off of the shelves by the bumbling walkers, but the place appears otherwise unlooted. They drag the bodies away from the door, examine them, and find none castrated. Santiago lets out a sigh of a relief. "Maybe those six were a fluke?"

"I'm telling you," Sarah insists, "they did something evil."

"Still, I'm not sure I want to encounter the people who did something so evil in return."

"Well aren't you a choir boy," Sarah replies.

They take two knives off the bodies and two magazines of 9 mm ammo, as well as three sets of intact boots. They might have gotten a fourth pair, but a rotten foot came off with the left boot, and when Carol tried to pull it out, it was congealed inside. It seemed too much trouble to clean it out. The boots will have to be sanitized and aired out for some time as is, but they're high quality. The emaciated walkers have been shuffling around inside for years, their clothes shielded from rain and mud and thorns and brambles. They salvage two leather jackets as well.

Next, they guide the cart inside and detach and unbridle the horses and set out fresh water for them. The door still open, and the sun still setting, Santiago lights an oil lantern and hangs it from the hook in the garage.

"Let's take the oil," Thomas says. They don't use it in cars anymore, but it has plenty of other uses. The group loads several cans onto the cart. They also take all the nuts, bolts, and screws for the builders, as well as a few useful tools to add to their collection. The plates have deteriorated on most of the car batteries, but they do find three that _might_ still hold a charge and could be put to use after being charged by the solar bay. If not, maybe the battery building engineers can salvage parts. Thomas consults the list from the power engineers and builders, and they gather anything else that seems a useful piece of equipment.

The sun now set, Carol rolls down the garage door. The horses whinny.

"God, I think those horses stink more than the cannibals," Santiago mutters. "Are they going to be farting all night?"

"Hold your breath, honey," Sarah tells him.

"Who's hungry?" Thomas asks as he unzips his pack and pulls out a couple of MREs.

"I could definitely eat," Carol says. She nods to Santiago. "And why don't you crack open that whiskey?"

[*]

Sweetheart's head lolls against Daryl's chest as she points sleepily at the picture of the moon. "Mooo!"

"Yep. Moon." He pushes off the floor and rocks the chair slightly as he turns the page. "And there were three little bears sitting on chairs," he reads. "And two little kittens."

"Kitty!" Sweetheart sits up suddenly and stabs her finger at the cat.

"Yep. 'S a kitty cat. And a pair of mittens. And a little toy house." Sweetheart slumps back against his chest again. "And a young mouse. And a comb and brush and a bowl full of mush."

"Muss," the toddler murmurs sleepily.

"Oatmeal," Daryl says. "Grits maybe. And a quiet old lady who was whispering…" He whispers in her ear, "Hushhh."

She giggles, and he can't help but smile.

He turns the page and continues, "Goodnight room. Goodnight moon. Goodnight cow jumping over the moon."

"Moo."

"Goodnight light, and the red balloon…" By the time he says all the goodnights, she's half asleep, and he shuts the book gently and whispers, "Goodnight Sweethearts everywhere."

But when he lays the book aside on the little end table, and puts his arms around her so he can stand and lay her in the bed, she jolts awake before he can even rise. She puts her little fingers together to make the baby sign for more.

"Nah, no more. 'S bedtime. Read four already."

Sweetheart pushes her fingertips together harder and more insistently.

"Well, shoutin' ain't gonna help. Already read ya four."

"Mama!"

"Mama only reads ya three. I seen 'er."

"Booo!" That's how she says book. Her little fingers go together again. "Boo!"

"Said no. 'S already half hour past yer bedtime."

Sweetheart ceases her demands but does something far worse. She turns her little mouth down into a sad, quiet pout and cranes her neck back to look up at Daryl.

"Awww….hell no. Don't do that."

"Pweeeease, Da-dee?" It's one of her rare sentences, and it's the first time she's ever called him _Daddy_. It's always been _Dada_ before. And damn if hearing it that way doesn't melt his heart just a little bit. And goddamn if she isn't blinking her eyelashes at him, too.

He sighs. " _Only_ cause ya asked nice." Daryl reaches over to the end table, digs under Goodnight Moon, and pulls out _The Belly Button Book._

Sweetheart sits forward and claps her hands.


	178. Chapter 178

Daryl awakens around two in the morning and tries to figure out why. He listens to the sounds of the night, but there's nothing unusual. When he sees that his arm is stretched out and his palm flat down on Carol's side of the bed, he realizes he awoke because Carol is not beside him.

He's slept alone in the woods while on overnight hunts; he's slept alone at the Hilltop, Oceanside, and Alexandria while making his trade rounds in the first year of their marriage; hell, he's slept alone for almost fifty years, but he's never, since their marriage, slept alone in a bed he's shared with Carol. Even when she does her night patrol, she's home by one in the morning.

When he remembers where she is, he worries for a moment. He reassures himself that most human threats are long gone now, that walkers are no match for Carol, and that she's with three other armed deputies, and then he rolls over and goes back to sleep.

[*]

Carol comes down from watch on the roof of the garage. She recovers her arrow from the one lonely walker that stumbled near the strip mall. It's quiet out there. If there's a camp in town, it's a ways off, maybe by the shipyard, like Thomas suggested.

She enters the garage through the office door and goes to shake Sarah awake. Because she's curled back against Santiago, Carol ends up waking him, too, but he goes straight back to sleep as Sarah takes the last watch of the night.

[*]

Sensing a presence, Daryl opens one eye. Sweetheart has climbed up into his bed and is staring at him. She snorts and then giggles. He opens the other eye. "Daaadeee!" she says.

"What?" he murmurs. The birds are chirping outside.

She snuggles up to him and he drapes an arm around her and drifts back to sleep. Ten minutes later, he wakes with a start. "Gotta get ya dressed. Gotta meet Mitch for the hunt."

When they're out of bed, he sees through the slightly open drape around her room that she's pulled down all the books on the second shelf of her bookcase and pulled out all the toys on the first. He wonders how long she's been awake, and he's glad she didn't try to climb that thing and pull it down on herself. Maybe, like Garland's doing with his bookcase, they should empty the whole thing until she's older.

He feeds Sweetheart quickly, gathers his gear, and then settles on her head the tiny toddler helmet he found while scavenging. He mounts his motorcycle, sweeps Sweetheart off her feet, and sets her between his legs on the seat. Using a long belt, Daryl straps her to his waist so she can't plunge off, and then he kick starts the bike and flies off through the stirring fort, through the opening in the fence, and down the winding path. Sweetheart screams, cries, and then finally laughs.

[*]

As Carol packs for the scouting expedition, Sarah slaps an open Yellow Pages down on the workbench. "There's a bicycle repair shop not far from the shipyard. Assuming we're not dealing with a camp, or we can get to it undetected, I think we should scavenge it for parts – chains, pedals, more WD-40, anything we might need to repair and maintain our bikes back at Jamestown."

"Good idea," Carol tells her. "We might even find a couple more working bicycles." Jamestown has a lot, but they could always use more. About half of the bicycles are privately owned, but half are stored for public use in three bike racks scattered throughout the camp.

Carol shrugs into her backpack and slings her bow on one shoulder and her rifle on the other. She clips an extra, loaded magazine to her belt, ready for whatever they might encounter out there.

[*]

The door to the daycare in the museum is shut and locked and there's no light on inside. Daryl rattles the doorknob. Then he glances at the handwritten sign to the left, with the hours. It doesn't open for another 45 minutes. "Shit," he mutters. Carol probably told him that. It's just, she's the one who usually drops the kid at daycare or at the Barron cabin. He just comes and goes as needed for hunting and leaves all the kid coverage planning to her.

He sighs, takes Sweetheart by the hand, and goes to the front of the museum where Mitch is waiting for him. "Can't go for another forty-five minutes. Daycare ain't open."

"You didn't check the hours before you told me when to meet?"

Daryl shrugs.

"I could have slept in if you'd told me sooner, man!"

"Sorry."

"Now there's not enough time to go back to my hut and then come back again." Mitch sighs. "I guess I'll just go read in the library." He heads for the theater where the books are stored.

Daryl crouches down until he's on Sweetheart's level. "Wanna go look at the fish in the river?"

Sweetheart jumps in place without leaving the floor. Her knees just bend and spring up. She throws up an arm with excitement and exclaims, "Fffffis!

[*]

Santiago hands the binoculars to Carol. Stomach down, head slightly above the lip of the roof of the building, she scours the shipyard. The ships are mostly burnt out and look unusable, as if maybe a fire caught and spread in years past and leaped from ship to ship before a rainstorm put it out. The docks are largely untouched, however, charred only in a spot or two. Eight people are there. Two women stand guard, one with an AR-15 and the other with an AR-10, looking about and pacing the docks while six men finish up their fishing.

The men leave with the fish slung over their shoulders, the women on their heels, guns still in hand, looking right and left and then ahead. They all walk toward an apartment complex on the other side of the shipyard, where they disappear through an iron gate rolled open by a female armed guard. There are over a dozen port-a-potties in the parking lot that have probably been dragged there from various construction sites. The apartment complex is made of two, two-story high buildings with a courtyard in between. The entire courtyard has been planted with four large garden plots. Ten men tend the gardens while four armed guards stroll around them. That makes twenty-three people, and at least seven rifles, but who knows how many more people and guns are inside the apartment building. On the left side of the complex, in a grassy area, bins have been set out to collect rainwater, and it looks like a crude well is being dug. On the right side, there's a chicken coop situated at the corner of the second building, and beside that a cage full of rabbits.

Carol passes the binoculars to Sarah, and once she has a look, they all slink back to the door at the top of the roof and disappear into the stairwell to confer.

"They have pretty well-established camp," Carol says. "They've been at it a year, I'd say."

"We need to get a closer look," Sarah says. "Find out how many, how well armed, and if they're peaceful."

"There's no way they're peaceful," Santiago says, "if they're cutting off balls. I don't care _what_ their reason was. That's not a peaceful way to run a civilization."

"Well, most camps aren't exactly _civilized_ in this world," Sarah reasons. "But that doesn't mean they want to kill everyone they encounter, either."

"I'm starting to feel like you've cut off a man's balls before," Santiago tells her.

"No, but I've _wanted_ to." Sarah thunders down the stairwell.

Santiago follows her. "Did something happen to you?"

Sarah ignores him and rounds the next flight of stairs. Carol trails them both.

"Did something happen to you?" Santiago asks again.

Sarah bursts into the lobby – which they've already cleared – and whirls back toward him. "A _lot_ of things happened to me. A lot of things happened to all of us before we were lucky enough to find the camps we did."

Santiago swallows and shifts uneasily on his feet. He wipes a hand across his mouth.

"Did you notice that all the guards were women?" Carol asks.

"No, there were some men," replies Sarah, looking relieved to have the subject changed.

Carol shakes her head. "There were two with buzz cuts. Maybe you only saw them from behind when you were looking. But I saw them from the front. Those were women. In fact, I didn't see a single man with a gun. Or a bow. Or anything other than a small work knife. And why were the guards patrolling armed _inside_ their own gates?"

"We patrol armed inside our gates," Sarah replies.

"A couple deputies at a time," Carol says, "over a two-mile expanse, to be available to deal with minor incidents. Not four guards with high-powered rifles, patrolling the workers like that. At the docks I thought they were just watching for walkers and keeping the fishermen safe. But _inside_ the gates like that…" Carol shakes her head. "I think they're guarding the men."

"Guarding them from _what_?" Santiago asks.

"Just guarding _them_ ," Carol says.

Santiago scratches the back of his neck. "Like prisoners?"

"Or slaves," Carol says. "Eunuchs."

"They castrate them to make them more docile, and then they make them serve them?" Santiago asks with horror.

"Okay, _that's_ not a good reason to castrate a man," Sarah concedes. "But they let six of those men bleed out? Instead of making them salves? Why?"

"Maybe that group of men somehow escaped immediately after they were castrated," Carol speculates. "They got out of the camp before their wounds could be cauterized. And then they died from blood loss."

"I wonder if some of these men are survivors from the old camp in Williamsburg?" Santiago muses. "Most were consumed by cannibals, but Raul said he saw several fleeing. He never could find them. Maybe they eventually made their way here and got captured."

"Maybe," Sarah agrees. "If they went southeast instead of southwest…they'd end up here instead of near Jamestown."

"We need to get on a higher building and take a better count," Carol says.

They stick to the shadows, duck behind cars, and scurry to another, closer, taller building. They make their way through the interior, killing a stray walker here or there, and emerge on the roof, where they duck and crawl to the edge. Before Santiago can get out the binoculars out, Carol can hear it – the distant clip clop of horse's hooves.

Santiago must hear it, too. "They have horses! I didn't see a barn, did you?"

"No," Carol replies.

Santiago raises his head just over the lip of the roof and looks toward the gates of the camp through the binoculars. " _Shit_ ," he curses.

"What?" Carol and Sarah ask simultaneously.

Santiago passes Carol the binoculars. She raises her head to peer toward the camp. There's a familiar, two-horse cart approaching the gates. An armed woman drives it. Two more armed women sit toward the back of the cart with a gagged and bound man between them. "Shit," Carol echoes Santiago. "Those aren't their horses. They're _ours_. And they've captured Thomas."


	179. Chapter 179

"Read anythin' good?" Daryl asks as they slip behind the tree line and into their hunting grounds. He's not much for small talk, but Mitch has been sullen and quiet this entire hike, and Daryl thinks he's still pissed off about the late start.

"I had a date at the tavern for lunch," Mitch says. "Now I won't be back in time for it."

"A date? With who?"

"James, of course."

"Witherspoon?" Daryl asks.

"Yeah. You know, my boyfriend?"

"'S just… when ya said date, though ya meant…ya know, someone new."

Mitch shakes his head. "You don't take Carol on dates?"

Daryl shrugs. "Ain't really a date if yer married."

"Of course it is. It has the same purpose as a date when you _aren't_ married. You're trying to get laid."

"Don't need to date m'wife to get laid."

"It sure doesn't hurt your chances, though, does it?" Mitch asks with a smirk as he swings his rifle off his shoulders and into his hands and takes the safety off.

Daryl loads up his crossbow. "Them appletinis sure help."

Mitch chuckles. "See, that's what I'm talking about." Mitch slaps him on the shoulder, and Daryl assumes all is forgiven.

[*]

Carol emerges from the shipyard and walks toward the gates of the apartment complex, hands up. She walks with her heart in her throat, her boots feeling heavier with each step, forcing herself to breathe evenly. Santiago and Sarah tried to talk her out of her plan, but what else is there to do?

They have to act quickly, before Thomas is made a eunuch, and maybe these women are more merciful to strange women than they are to strange men. Besides, there's no way they'll believe Thomas was alone, not after capturing a two-horse cart. No doubt he's lied and told them he's alone, but they'll likely go out looking for his group soon, especially if they saw their ship pass earlier. Carol doesn't want them looking. If she turns herself in, throwing herself on their mercy, and convinces them she's been wandering alone with Thomas and looking for a camp, maybe they won't go searching. Maybe they'll stay inside their gates long enough for Sarah and Santiago to get back to the salt ponds and organize an army.

Even as Carol walks now, the other two deputies are headed for the bicycle repair shop, so they can grab a couple of bikes and get back faster than they would be able to on foot. There are thirty armed naval men and workmen at those salt ponds that can descend upon this camp, but it's going to take them hours to march here. There are no council members back at the ponds. Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado, as the highest-ranking Naval officer present, will have to lead the army. Or maybe Santiago, as the acting sheriff in the absence of the sheriff, will insist on doing so. At any rate, Carol is fairly confident Santiago and Sarah will persuade them to come, and when they do, they'll easily outnumber the seven armed guards Carol's seen so far. Of course, there may be more guns and women inside the apartments. That's one of the many things she's here to learn. The gardens don't look like they can feed a camp larger than forty, however.

The barrel of an AR-10 is leveled at her through the thinly spaced bars of the iron gate to the parking lot. The woman holding it is white with a dark complexion, a Grecian nose, and tightly curled brown hair that falls just to her shoulders. "Don't move a step closer," she says.

"I'm Carol." She puts an exaggerated tremble in her voice and adds a hint of almost-tears for good measure. "I'm looking for my friend. I was out scavenging, and when I returned to our temporary camp…he wasn't there. While I was searching for him, I saw your gardens, saw you had a camp, and I was hoping maybe you'd seen him."

An African-American woman draws near the gates with a rifle slung casually over her shoulder. Her hair is shaved close to her scalp, and a zig-zag is etched in the dark stubble from her forehead to the back of her skull. Her eyes are a deep, piercing blue that contrast sharply and unexpectedly with her skin tone. Carol's never seen a black woman with blue eyes before, but she can't possibly be wearing contact lenses.

The African-American woman eyes her suspiciously. "Sister," she says to the guard, "Is she with the man?"

"She says so," the guard replies.

"You've found my friend?" Carol asks with feigned surprise. "Is he here? Can I see him?"

The woman levels her cool, blue eyes at Carol. "If you want to come inside, strip yourself of your weapons and lay them before the gate."

Carol hasn't brought her rifle. She left it hidden in the building from which they spied on the camp, so she can it get later if needed. She unsnaps the sheath of her hunting knife and throws the weapon and sheath in its entirety on the asphalt.

"That's it?" the blue-eyed woman asks skeptically.

Carol nods. She gave her brass knuckle knife to Sarah. It's her favorite, and she doesn't want to risk losing it permanently. She gave Santiago one of her other knives and left the fourth hidden with the rifle. Having no weapon at all might not be believable, but she wants to look vulnerable and desperate, as if she and Thomas had recently fled a fallen camp and couldn't grab much. They managed to flee on a horse and cart, and now they're just out roaming, scavenging, and looking for a place to settle. "That's all," she insists. "I wasn't able to grab any weapons when we fled our last camp. It got overrun. I found the knife while we were scavenging."

"You weren't on that ship?" the black woman asks.

 _Shit_. They saw the ship. "No, but we saw it sailing down the river. We tried to hail it, to get it to stop, to see if they'd take us in, but it kept going. It must be long gone by now. They're probably sailing to Mexico."

"That's what the man said."

"He's here?" Carol asks again. "Can I see him?"

The gate rolls open with a creak. The guard immediately falls behind Carol and presses her rifle into Carol's back. "Move forward." Carol does.

The blue-eyed, African-American woman pats her down and says, "She's clean." She holds out a hand. "I'm Zami."

Carol's surprised by the seemingly friendly gesture and reaches out a hand tentatively to shake. "Carol."

"Come with me." Zami jerks her head forward and Carol falls in step with her as the guard rolls the gate shut and returns to guarding it.

As they walk through the parking lot and begin to pass the long row of port-a-poties, an unarmed woman with short, blonde hair walks by carrying what looks to be a jug of water. She wears a white t-shirt with the letter D stained on the back. Carol's not sure what was used for ink, but it looks almost like dried blood. "Hello, sister," the woman says to Zami. "I'm bringing all the sisters water. Would you like some?"

"No thank you, postulant D."

The blonde woman nods and walks on. As Zami leads Carol on, she says, "I'm surprised he let you have a knife."

"Who?" Carol asks.

"You're so-called friend. Thomas."

 _Let her?_ Carol's not sure what to make of that. "It's for killing the walkers."

Zami stops walking right in front of the last, foul-smelling port-a-potty. "He called them cannibals."

"Cannibals, walkers. We had different names before we ended up in the same camp. It's not the first camp I've lost."

Zami nods as if accepting this explanation and resumes walking. Carol thinks she's averted suspicion on that particular issue at least. As they near the courtyard between the buildings, curious men look up from their work in the fields. "Back to work!" one of the female guards shouts, and the shovels and hoes go down again. Men weed and water and plant.

"Lazy shits, aren't they?" Zami asks. "In the before time, they always got away with the least domestic work they possibly could, always sure a woman would pick up their slack for them. Well, no more."

Carol thinks it best to remain silent. They enter the foyer of one of the two-story apartment buildings. Carol looks around for any sign of where they might be hiding Thomas, but she sees only a staircase, a non-working elevator, and two hallways that lead left and right. There's a large glass window at the end of the foyer that looks out onto a rusted jungle gym. Zami sees her looking out the window and says, "We won't be needing that. We aren't burdened by children, and we won't be. That's how women were kept down in the past."

Carol can't help but think of Sweetheart back home, and she feels a sudden pang of affection, longing, and fear. What if she doesn't make it out of this camp alive? What if she never sees her daughter again? Children aren't an easy responsibility, especially not in an apocalypse, but Carol wonders who these women are building this camp for if they expect the world to end with them. "You have no children here at all?"

"Not anymore." Those words send a chill up Carol's spine. Did they lose their children, or abandon them, or murder them? "None of my sisters will ever be made pregnant again."

 _Made pregnant_. It's an odd word choice, Carol thinks, and she wonders if these women were raped and abused in the past. "Your sisters?" Carol asks as Zami leads her down the hallway to the right. She knows Zami means the word metaphorically, but she pretends not to know. "Do you come from a big family? How many sisters do you have?"

"The Sisterhood has thirteen sisters and five postulants."

That makes up to eighteen armed women, Carol thinks, depending on whether or not the _postulants_ are permitted to have guns. She suspects they aren't, based on the one she saw in the parking lot. "And the men in the fields?" Carol asks innocently. "Are they like your brothers?"

Zami scoffs through her nose. "They're domestics." She stops before a door with the words Rental Office etched on a gold placard. She swings it open and tells Carol to have a seat in the armchair across from the oak desk, which Zami sits behind.

Carol settles into the stiff, leather chair and scans the bookcase behind Zami. There are binders of information that seem original with the rental office, along with phonebooks, but there's also an entire row of books that clearly weren't here at the start, based on their public library binding and the decimals on their spines. They've been scavenged and brought here. The titles are mostly unfamiliar to Carol: _The Superior Excellence of Women Over Men_ , _The Destructive Male_ , _The Feminine Mystique_ , _Sisterhood is Powerful_ , _Zami: A New Spelling of My Name_ , _Sexual Politics_ …Carol quickly flits her eyes away so she doesn't appear to be reading the titles.

Zami – if that's even her name, if she hasn't borrowed it from that book behind her - keeps her rifle on her shoulder but lays her hands on the desk.

"How long have you lived here?" Carol asks. She's not sure she should risk being so bold as to venture yet another question, but so far this leader of the Sisterhood – if she _is_ the leader – seems willing to talk.

"A year and a half," Zami answers. "We were at Cape Charles before that. But we sailed here, down the bay, around Hampton, and up the James River. We only docked here to loot. We were planning to head up to Jamestown and see if we could settle in the old fort there. We thought that might be a good place for a camp." Carol keeps her lips tightly closed at this revelation. She wonders if Jamestown would have taken them in, had they shown up in a ship at their river gates. "But then there was a thunderstorm," Zami continues. "Lightning struck our ship, and it caught fire. The fire spread throughout the shipyard…it was a while before the rains put it out. We couldn't sail on. So we just settled here."

"You're a sailor?" Carol asks. At this point she's just trying to keep the conversation going to keep the information flowing.

"No, but the sisters and I took charge at Cape Charles. We overthrew our oppressors." Carol suspects that means that they may have been kept as slaves there themselves, maybe as sex slaves, given their penchant for castration. "Unfortunately, taking charge meant having to set a lot of things on fire. It was uninhabitable by the time we were done. We made the surviving men sail us on."

"What do you plan to do with my friend?" Carol ventures finally.

"Listen," Zami says softly, sympathetically, as she looks Carol right in the eyes. Those piercing eyes soften to an almost cloudy blue. "Now that you're here, he can't abuse you anymore."

"What?" Carol asks.

"That man we captured. Thomas."

"He hasn't abused me. He – "

"- I know you tell yourself that, to get through it. To do what you have to do for your own survival. But it's still rape. And he can't do it anymore."

Carol swallows. What does she mean he _can't_ do it anymore? Have they already… "Thomas hasn't hurt me."

Zami tilts her head skeptically.

"Really, he hasn't…" Carol glances behind the woman's shoulder, at one of the spines of the books, which says, _Intercourse_. "We've never had sex."

"He's homosexual, then?" Zami asks with narrowed eyes.

Carol contemplates answering in the affirmative. Maybe they spare homosexual men castration. Then again, maybe they execute them. "I don't know," she says finally, thinking that the safest response and the one that might buy Thomas the most time.

A woman with light brown, wavy hair raps on the inside of the door. There's a handgun on her left hip and a large knife on the right. None of the sisters walk these halls unarmed, Carol thinks. "Yes, sister?" Zami asks.

"Postulant A has a migraine. She says she can't do the taming until it passes."

Zami sighs. "Is she faking it do you think?"

"It seems real. She's lying down in the dark right now. Should I have a sister do it?"

"No. Postulant A needs to complete her initiation. She hasn't done a taming yet, and she can't become a sister and receive a name until she does. Tell her we'll wait for the migraine to pass to hold the ceremony. Keep the man under lock and key until then."

The woman nods and looks Carol over curiously. "Is she a new postulant?"

"We're getting to that. Leave us."

"Yes, sister." The woman shuts the door on her way out.

"What's the taming?" Carol asks, trying to hide the nervous tinge to her voice, because she's pretty sure _the taming_ is castration and that Thomas is the man they plan to _tame_. By now, Carol thinks, Sarah and Santiago are already on those bikes and pedaling as fast as they can. They'll be at the salt ponds in an hour, she hopes, and the march back will take maybe four hours. They'll have this place surrounded sometime in the middle of the night. How long does a migraine last? Or, if this postulant is faking the migraine, as Zami intimated, perhaps to avoid having to do the ugly dead, how long can she get away with faking it?

Zami leans forward and again locks her cool, blue eyes with Carol's. "I know Thomas has convinced you that you need him, that he's not subjugating you. But you _don't_ need him. You can be both wholly free and wholly in command. We can show you the way, if you want us to. We can undo the social brainwashing you received from the patriarchy in the time before. We can undo the indoctrination your so-called _friend_ has fed you. We can liberate you entirely from the oppression of the aggressive male and offer you the freedom of the Sisterhood. If you want to seek that freedom, you must be a postulant first. If you prove yourself faithful, you may one day become a sister. Do you want to begin your journey to liberation?"

Carol has no choice but to buy time, and this might be a way to gain information for when the confrontation with Jamestown's people occurs. And maybe she can delay Thomas's castration a few hours longer. And if she has to be a convincing postulant, if she has to play this game, she can always channel all her anger over those years of abuse she received at Ed's hands and talk with convincing spite of her first husband. "I want to be free," Carol says. "Teach me."


	180. Chapter 180

"Yum, yum, yum," Daryl says as he cups his hands closed over the cricket he's caught in the corner of the cabin.

His hunt with Mitch was successful. It wasn't even a hunt really. They checked their bear trap, and there was one hundred pounds of pure meat waiting for them. They just had to put it out of its misery, field dress the beast, and then drag it – ever so slowly - to the butcher.

"Stinky, yuum!" Sweetheart says, bouncing in place near the plastic bin where they're keeping the little brown skink.

Daryl shifts the cricket to a single hand and inches up the edge of the bin's lid with the other. He drops the live cricket inside and quickly pushes the lid shut as the cricket leaps up. The little brown skink scurries after it, its long tail slithering like a snake. But when it seizes the cricket with its mouth and begins to suck it in bite after bite, Sweetheart screams. She screams like she's just seen a walker bite into a person.

Daryl whisks her up in his arms and walks her away from the scene of feasting. He bounces her up and down until she quiets to a sniffle. With her fingers shoved in her mouth, she cranes her neck back to look toward the bin where her pet skink has just finished its meal.

"Hell did ya _think_ was gonna happen?" Daryl asks her.

She slides her fingers from her mouth. "Stinky yum?" she asks.

"Yeah, Stinky ate the cricket all up. Yum yum yum. Circle of life 'n shit."

Sweetheart squirms in his arms, and he sets her down. She runs over to the bin, puts her little nose against the plastic, and says, "Stinky, yum!"

[*]

Zami leads Carol into an efficiency apartment. There's a small living room, a tiny kitchen, and then a short hall with a bathroom off one side and a bedroom off the other. There's a window overlooking the side parking lot, but it's completely covered with black, iron bars on the outside. There's no sneaking out at night, it seems. A domestic – a tall, fifty-something, salt-and-pepper-haired man with blue-green eyes, has just finished dusting the coffee table – the only piece of living room furniture besides a single blue armchair – when they enter. He stands straight, folds his dust rag in half, and casts his eyes down to the carpet.

"Is the bed made?" Zami asks.

"Yes, mistress," the man replies.

"And the shirt pressed?" Zami asked.

"Yes, mistress."

"Very well. Join the others to prepare dinner."

The domestic scurries out, not daring to look at Carol.

"This will be your cloister until you become a sister and are promoted to the other wing," Zami explains to Carol as the door clicks shut. Carol looks around. The living room has a fireplace with freshly chopped wood lain in it, and a kettle hangs above the wood. There's a jar of instant coffee sitting on the bar of the efficiency kitchen, next to a small plate of fresh strawberries and three, 1-liter glass bottles filled with water. One solitary stool sits before the counter. There's a microwave, a minifridge, a refrigerator, and a sink, none of which, Carol presumes, actually work. In a stack on the living room coffee table is some reading material – _The Awakening_ , _Madam Bovary_ , _The Handmaid's Tale_. A white shirt is neatly folded and draped over the back of the blue armchair.

"Communal meals are in the club house at 6 AM, 12 PM, and 7 PM," Zami tells her. "Don't be late. Use the port-a-poties in the parking lot for your restroom needs, prior to curfew. Curfew is at 8:30 PM. If you are found outside your cloister between the hours of 8:30 PM and 5:45 AM, you will be corrected. There is to be no communication with the domestics other than to give orders. Avoid eye contact with them."

Zami, who's a good six inches taller than Carol, strolls like a cat to the armchair and slides the shirt off. She shakes it out and examines it with narrowed eyes, murmuring, "A wrinkle. He'll be docked half a meal tonight." She holds the shirt up and presses it against Carol's chest. She must judge its size to be appropriate, because she draws it back and says, "Take your shirt off."

Carol, feeling uncomfortable and very much watched, unbuttons the light, short-sleeve, pale pink shirt she's wearing over her summer tank top, sheds it, and takes the white t-shirt. She pulls it over her tank. It feels like it's made of thick, soft, cotton. "When do I get my letter?" Carol asks, as though she's actually eager to have one. Postulant D did, on the back of her shirt, but this shirt is blank.

"After the taming. We'll need the ink from the ceremony."

Carol has to go someplace else in her mind not to think about what that means. She can't let her horror show in her eyes. The letter on Postulant D's back looked like it was written in blood. Does Zami really mean they intend to use the blood from Thomas's castration to mark Carol's shirts?

"You are no longer Carol," Zami tells her. "You are Postulant F. When you become a sister, you will receive a strong woman's name like the other sisters. Tonight, just get settled in. Tomorrow morning at 7 AM, after breakfast, you will have your first session."

"Session?" Carol asks.

"Your first educational session. In my experience, it takes anywhere from two to six months to completely undo the brainwashing you received from the patriarchy."

"Is that how long the other postulants have been here?" Carol asks.

"Postulants A, B, and C we rescued five months ago. They were near starved, barely hanging on. Their oppressors, fortunately, had been devoured by the shadows."

Carol supposes that means the men in their group were eaten by walkers, perhaps trying to save the lives of the women.

"Two months ago," Zami continues, "we found D and E. Like you, they showed up at our gates looking for their oppressors, whom we'd captured while they were out scavenging. But both women are thankfully coming to understand they do not need to subjugate themselves."

So two of these women's showed up at the gates looking for their boyfriend or husbands, Carol thinks, hoping to find them safely inside. And now those women are being brainwashed into the Sisterhood.

"Settle in," Zami tells her. "It's almost dinner time."

[*]

"Eat the damn green bean!" Daryl mutters. Sweetheart's just been playing with it, slapping it against her tray like it's a whip or something.

"Dam!" Sweetheart echoes.

"Aww, shit. Don't be sayin' that. Yer mama's gonna blame me."

"Shhhhit!"

Daryl slaps his hand over his eyes.

Sweetheart laughs, that cute little girlish chortle of hers.

Daryl sighs, lowers his hand, and picks up one of the green beans on her tray. "Airplane comin' in." He starts making an airplane noise as he flies the bean toward her. Sweetheart looks at him with narrowed eyes and closed lips as though to say, _You are a strange man, father._

His hand freezes mid-air. "Ya ain't never gonna see an airplane fly, are you?" He thinks for a minute. "Less'n ya figure out how fix one up one day when yer all grown. Well, and how to fly and how to refine the fuel and…yeah. No. Ya ain't never gonna see one fly."

Sweetheart's eyes soften and she looks at him sympathetically, as if she senses the thought makes him sad. She pops the green bean that's in her hand into her mouth. Sweetheart chews deliberately, with a pronounced movement of her mouth, her eyes half closed, saying "Mhmmmmm." Then she opens her mouth wide, to show him the bean's all gone, as if that's the best consolation she can offer him.

Daryl smiles.

[*]

Carol left her room ten minutes after Zami was gone, hoping to find where they were keeping Thomas. She saw that several rooms in the apartment building had latches with padlocks on the outside, but the padlocks were all open and hanging loose, except for one. She whispered Thomas's name at the padlocked door, and then spoke it a little louder, but received no reply. When a sister rounded the hallway and asked her if she was lost, she pretended to be, and was directed back to her own room. When dinner time neared, there was a knock on Carol's door, and a sister introduced herself as Lilith and said she had come to escort her to dinner.

Carol walks alongside her now. Lilith wears tight, blue jeans, a silky red blouse, and a Ruger AR-556, which is slung over her right shoulder. She's taller than Carol, by about three inches, ten years younger at least, and a bit stockier, but in a moment of surprise, Carol might be able to take her.

They enter a clubhouse behind the second apartment building. Lilith leads Carol into a large conference room where several folding tables and chairs are set up. Through the bay windows at the back, she can see a covered, vented porch overlooking a pool, which is apparently being used to collect rainwater. Three domestics cook on grills on the porch, and the scent of mesquite wafts through the partially open windows at the sides of the room.

On the bulletin board on the wall to the left, handwritten quotes are tacked up by blue, white, and red pushpins:

 _"A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle." – Irina Dunn_

 _"The nuclear family must be destroyed…the break-up of families is an objectively revolutionary process." - Linda Gordon_

 _"Since marriage constitutes slavery for women…Freedom for women cannot be won without the abolition of marriage." – Sheila Cronan_

 _"Intercourse is the pure, sterile, formal expression of men's contempt for women," – Andrea Dworkin_

 _"When a woman reaches orgasm with a man, she is only collaborating with the patriarchal system, eroticizing her own oppress - "_

"- This way." Lilith interrupts Carol's reading, and she jerks her eyes from the bulletin board.

Carol is seated at a table with the other postulants, except for A, who is apparently still at rest from her migraine, if she's even having a migraine. Lilith goes to join the sisters at another, longer table. Carol quickly memorizes the letters and faces of the postulants – there's B, a middle-aged Hispanic woman, C, an Indian woman with straight, black hair falling to her shoulders; D, the blonde woman she saw earlier in the parking lot, who looks to be in her mid-forties; and E, a pretty young woman with platinum blonde hair who might be 18 or 19.

A domestic - a rather handsome, young black-haired man who can't be more than twenty-two - fills Carol's water glass from a pitcher. He then fills the water glass of E. Carol notices their eyes lock for the briefest moment, and a ghost of a smile touches E's lips before her eyes flit back to her plate. Carol makes careful note of the seemingly affectionate exchange. She's not the only one who notices it, however. D does, too, and she shoots a searing, warning look at postulant E, who swallows.

Six domestics serve the women their dinner and then mold to the walls, stand straight, and look into the corners of the room, awaiting further orders, Carol supposes. She doesn't know where the rest of them are at the moment. Locked in their rooms, perhaps, those padlocks now clicked shut.

Carol watches to see when and how the women begin eating. They don't pick up their forks, so neither does she.

Zami stands from where she sits at the center of the long table of the sisters. Eleven sisters are there. Two must be on guard duty. Zami raises her water glass. "Let us take this opportunity to welcome our newest postulant. Welcome, F."

"Welcome, F!" the rest of the sisters and postulants chorus, raising their glasses.

Carol's not sure if she's supposed to raise hers, so she doesn't.

"May you achieve liberation," Zami intones.

"May you learn to roar," the sisters and postulants respond.

"May you overcome your oppressors," Zami annunciates.

"May you never again be a footstool," the sisters and postulants chorus.

Zami's piercing blue eyes shoot in Carol's direction. "May you shed the shackles of your former brainwashing."

"May you be enlightened by the free love of the Sisterhood!" Upon this final chorus, everyone lowers their glasses and Zami sits.

They all begin eating, and so Carol does, too. Conversation drifts across the postulant's table, on mostly mundane matters – the quality of the food, if it's been a little overcooked, the weather, a book one of them has read, about some woman, oppressed by some man, who finally finds depths of power within herself and kills him in his sleep.

No one asks Carol anything, so she stays silent for now.

C asks, "Who has the privilege of going to Sister Zami's room tonight?"

"The new postulant, I'd guess," B replies, looking at Carol somewhat jealously.

"She never shows the postulants the superior love on their first night," C insists.

"It's me," E says, her voice somewhat unsteady. "She already told me. She was waiting for me to turn nineteen." She doesn't sound particularly happy about the fact.

"The superior love?" Carol asks, venturing a question at last.

"Where men are involved," C tells her earnestly, "all sex is rape. But where women are involved, there is liberation."

"Ah," is all Carol will say. She's starting to get the picture, and she's glad Zami never shows the postulants the _superior love_ on the first night, because she doesn't want to have to play along with that.

After dinner, the domestics clear the dishes and disappear outside to wash them. The sisters depart, except for one, who remains as an armed guard over the dishwashing domestics, and the postulants pick up rags. C hands one to Carol. "I can't wait until I'm a sister and I'm liberated from _all_ domestic duties. I'll never wipe another table again."

Carol wonders what the sisters do, besides stand guard with firearms. It's possible they don't do any work at all. While they're wiping down tables, Carol joins E. She suspects the young E is the least onboard with the program, and she hopes to get some information. "When do you have to join Sister Zami tonight?" she asks, hoping that perhaps the Jamestown navy will be here in time to spare the poor girl that abuse.

"Sometime after the taming."

"When will the - "

D shoves herself between them, jostling Carol to the right. "E, you're needed to clean the sister's table she insists sternly." E casts her eyes to the ground and walks off.

Carol busies herself with scrubbing the table, tensely aware that D must be suspicious of her conversation with E. Her hand freezes mid stroke when D says, "A word to the wise. Leave my daughter alone."

Carol glances with surprise at E. So D's sternness toward E was that of a mother who fears for her daughter. Carol puts the pieces together, considers the physical appearances, and decides that the domestic who was preparing her room is E's father and D's husband. The young domestic who filled their glasses must be E's boyfriend from before they came here, since Zami said D and E came looking for their oppressors. Carol thinks perhaps D has taken a gamble by saying the word _daughter_ at all. She wonders if they're even allowed to refer to such family relationships here.

"You'll bring nothing but grief upon her," D continues. "Keep your eyes to yourself, your questions to yourself, and all nonconforming _thoughts_ to yourself. Play along to get along."

"We found six walkers mutilated," Carol says hastily in a low voice. "They looked like they'd been entirely mutilated from the waist down and then left to die outside these gates."

"I wasn't here back then."

"But you know what happened to them?" Carol asks.

D looks left and then right to make sure they aren't being watched. She scrubs as she talks. "In the taming ceremony, they remove the testicles. But castrated men can still get erections. One of the men raped a postulant. A woman he still called his wife."

"Raped?" Carol asks skeptically.

D drops her rag on the table with irritation and stands straight. "These are the sort of nonconformist thoughts you need to stop having."

"How did he get outside the gates?"

"The sisters decided to cut off his penis, as punishment, and then they cast him out. Five of the domestics rebelled when the sisters did that. But they were subdued, further maimed, and cast out to, too. I suppose they bled to death out there, or developed an infection. They - " She stops suddenly, bends over the table, and scrubs with the rag.

Carol does the same. She knows why when she hears Zami's voice. "I've informed Postulant A that her migraine should have passed by now," Zami announces. "The taming will be in half an hour. I want all of the postulants present for the ceremony."

As Zami's bootsteps disappear out of the clubhouse, Carol's heart crawls into her throat. Her Jamestown people won't be here in half an hour, no matter how quickly they've been marching.


	181. Chapter 181

Hazy, late evening sunlight filters through the iron bars on the living room window as all six postulants, including Carol, follow Zami inside an apartment. One of the sisters, Lilith, takes up the rear with her semiautomatic rifle in her hands. Carol notes Zami has a handgun on her left hip and a knife on her right. Lilith also has a knife.

Two firearms. Two knives. Too many weapons for Carol to fight against alone.

They're led into the center of the completely empty living room, where Zami raises a hand slightly. The rest of the postulants seem to know what to do. They form a circle with her at its apex. Carol falls in. Only Lilith stands on the outside of the circle, rifle in hand.

"Today, Postulant F," Zami tells Carol, "you will witness your first taming, and thereby receive your letter. And today, Postulant A, you shall become a sister."

Postulant A nods, but her dark brown eyes have a look of unease in them. She's about thirty, and thin, as if she hasn't been eating much, despite the full meals they seem to have. Her brown hair is curly and billows over her shoulders in front, falling down over her small breasts. Everything about her seems very small at the moment.

"I know you were faking the migraine," Zami says coolly.

Postulant A's eyes widen in terror.

"I forgive you," Zami assures her. "It happens to many postulants before their initiation, these second thoughts. But rest assured, you're doing the right thing. The _necessary_ thing. You're liberating yourself from the oppressor. And once you have, you'll feel your own power." The knife rasps as Zami draws it from the sheath on her belt. She turns it sideways by the handle. A opens her hands, palms up, and Zami lays the knife in them. "Let us proceed."

Zami turns and walks toward the bedroom, with Postulant A, gripping the knife nervously by its handle, following. The other postulants trail after her, in letter order, with Carol at the rear, and the armed guard breathing down her neck behind her.

[*]

"Voooooom." Sweetheart runs a matchbox car across the wicker coffee table. Daryl closes the cap on his tin of wax and stands to hang his crossbow on the back of the door. When he sits back down on the couch again, Sweetheart has shoved the car halfway into her mouth. Daryl sighs and pries it from her and sets the slobber-covered vehicle back on the table. "Choke yerself that way."

Sweetheart begins pushing the car again. Daryl eases back onto the couch with a sigh. He's bored. He loves the kid, but other than the few hours it took to check the traps and field dress and drag that bear today, he hasn't done a damn useful thing, and there's only so much building with blocks and pushing of cars and giving of horsey back rides and pretending to eat fake pies he can take.

He usually stays outside of the cabin until dinner time, finding work to do, whether its hunting or skinning or tinkering with his bike or helping out someone who seems to need helping. Carol works too, of course, but when she's not on the clock, she's with the girl. How does she do this so many hours a day? It's tedious. Carol probably gets more work done _while_ she's watching the kid. After all, the beds are always made up and the place is always tidy and swept and the laundry's always done and dinner is always on the table. He doesn't know how she juggles it all, because it seems anytime he tries to do something other than watch the girl like a hawk – even when he just goes to hang up his bow – Sweetheart gets into something or ends up with an object shoved in her mouth.

She holds up the car now. "Gay!"

"Yep, that's Gary's car." The little boy saw Sweetheart liked it and gave it to her yesterday when they were heading out of the Barron cabin.

"Vooom!" Sweetheart gives the car a big push and it flies across the wicker table and clatters onto the wood floor. Daryl bends over to pick it up, and when he sits up and sets it on the table, Sweetheart's gone. He looks around frantically to make sure she's not sticking her head in the wood stove or something. She's gone to the bookcase in her room, and now she toddles back and slaps a book down on the cushion beside him.

Daryl drags her up into his lap and picks up her selection. She lounges back against his chest as he opens the book. This part of playing daddy is the part he likes the best: the feel of her warm and cuddled against him, the way her eyes grow wide at some of the pictures, her cute voice when she tries to echo the words, and the way she tugs on her little ear when she's getting sleepy.

He can't remember either of his parents ever reading to him. He can't even remember having children's books in the cabin. He doesn't even _like_ reading, not really, not unless there's a reason, like he needs to learn how to convert an engine to run on ethanol. Then he likes the knowledge more than he likes the words. But he likes reading to her. To his baby girl.

He looks at the colorful cover of the book, with a big, crudely drawn palm tree, and the words _Chicka Chicka Boom Boom,_ before opening it and finding his way to the first page. "A told B," he reads, "and B told C, I'll meet you at the top of the coconut tree." He turns a page. "Whee! said D…"

[*]

A, B, C, D and E surround the bed where Thomas lies bound and gagged, A at the middle of the left side, right at his belt line. Zami stands ominously at the foot of the bed and motions to Carol to take the last spot on the right side. Her heart beating with dread, Carol does. The guard Lilith stands off to the side, between the bed and the door.

Thomas's wrists are tied with rope knotted to the bedpost, and his ankles are likewise bound. Carol was fully prepared to give him some sign to pretend not to recognize her, but she doesn't have to. He's blindfolded, too. She just has to keep her mouth shut, so he doesn't recognize her voice and show his recognition. And she has to figure out how to stop this mutilation.

She judges the position of every armed person – Zami, Lilith, and A with the knife, though she doesn't think A will be a threat to her when she does make her move. How she's going to do that without getting shot, Carol doesn't know. Yet.

Zami leans over the bed and unbuckles Thomas's belt. He screams against his gag and writhes in place on the bed. "Silence!" Zami orders. "This will be easier if you cooperate."

Thomas stills. His fingers grip the ropes tightly. If Carol could see his eyes, she thinks there would be the same dead look in them she sometimes got in her own while she was waiting for Ed's abuses to be over.

Zami undoes his pants and jerks them down. Then she opens a medical kit on the bed by his foot. She takes out a box of matches and some kind of cloth torch and lays them on top of the bedspread. She'll be cauterizing the wound, Carol supposes, but it doesn't look like they're knocking him out for this "surgery" or giving him any kind of pain killer.

"Now, Postulant A," Zami says. "Liberate yourself and earn your full place in the Sisterhood."

Postulant A closes her eyes and inhales through her nose. Her eyelashes flutter open, and she steps forward until her thighs are pressed against the edge of the bed. She raises the knife from her side.

[*]

"The whole alphabet," Daryl reads, "up the – uh oh!"

"Uh oh!" Sweetheart echoes softly. And then there's that ear tug. Sweetheart's going to be out a few minutes earlier than usual, and that's just fine with Daryl.

He lowers his reading voice to a whisper: "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom! Skit skat doodle doot. Flip flop flee."

"Fleeeeeeeeeee," Sweetheart murmurs as her eyes droop shut.

"Everybody running to the coconut tree."

Sweetheart's eyes shoot up suddenly and she sits up straight. "Mama!"

Daryl looks at the door, thinking she's heard a rustling there, like she did last night, but he doesn't hear it. "Mama'll be home day after tomorruh."

Sweetheart turns in his arms. "Mama uh oh."

"Mama's fine. Mama's just lookin' for supplies. Yer mama's strong." He flexes a muscle in his arm and _grrrrs_ , and Sweetheart laughs. "Ain't no one messes with yer mama."

Seemingly content with this, Sweetheart flops back against his chest again. Daryl surrounds her with a strong arm, holds the book in one hand, and continues reading.

[*]

A's hand trembles. Sunlight flickers off the knife. "I can't."

"You must," Zami says.

"I can't." Her hand falls open, and the knife falls to the mattress between Thomas's legs.

Carol lunges for the weapon, snatches it up in an instant, and drives it with one smooth, upward cut motion straight into Zami's throat. Carol barely hears the gasps of horror around her as she lets go of the hilt and yanks Zami's handgun from its holster. The woman staggers backward, clutching her bleeding throat.

Carol whirls on the armed guard, who is still staring in shocked horror at her bleeding leader. Lilith swings her rifle in Carol's direction and reaches for the trigger, but not before Carol pulls off a single shot. The bang echoes in the small room. The bullet tears through Lilith's forehead and lodges in the wall behind her as the sister slumps to the floor.

[*]

"Mamas and papas and uncles and aunts," Daryl whispers, "hug their little dears," he gives Sweetheart a squeeze, "and dust their pants." Sweetheart tugs again on her earlobe. Her mouth opens in a wide yawn.

Daryl balances the book on the arm of the couch to turn the page so he doesn't have to let go of Sweetheart with his other hand. "'Help us up!,' cried A B C," Daryl whisper-reads. "Next from the pile up, skinned-knee D…"

[*]

D's eyes are darting frantically around the room. A and E have backed themselves in horror into the corner. Thomas turns his head left and right and cries against his gag while straining at the ropes.

C must be sold on Zami's brainwashing, because she grabs the sister's fallen rifle from the floor. Carol tries to shoot her, but the handgun jams. Frantically, she racks the slide, hard, twice, until the jammed bullet expels, but by now C is already standing again, leveling the rifle at Carol, and reaching for the trigger.

B, growling, rushes C like a wild animal, and the bullet goes into her instead of Carol. When B collapses to the carpet like a ragdoll, Carol shoots C with the now unjammed handgun.

Carol's eyes flit defensively to D, and the blonde woman puts up her hands, even though she's not holding a weapon. "My daughter and I are with you."

"Me, too," A insists from her corner.

"Just tell us what to do," E says.

[*]

"Skit skat doodle doop," Daryl reads, "Flip flop flee."

"Fleeeeeee!" Sweetheart's voice is soft and sleepy.

Daryl turns the page. "Look who's coming!"

[*]

There are shouts in the hallway, armed sisters, no doubt, rushing toward the sound of gunshots. "Untie him!" Carol orders as she scoops up Lilith's rifle with her free hand.

D begins undoing the ropes around Thomas's left wrist. Her daughter E scurries forward to help with the right wrist. Postulant A abandons her huddled spot in the corner, takes the knife off the belt of the fallen Lilith, and cuts the ropes around Thomas's legs loose. Carol kicks the bedroom door shut to buy them an extra few seconds.

When his blindfold comes off, Thomas flushes bright red and jerks up his pants. He zips, but doesn't bother to snap his pants or buckle his belt, as Carol shoves the rifle into his hands. "These three women are with us. The ones coming this way aren't. Get ready to shoot!"

Thomas scurries to his feet. The front door of the apartment thuds against the interior wall. Thomas and Carol throw themselves to opposite sides of the bedroom door just before a semi-automatic spray of bullets pierces through the wood. E hasn't moved in time, so D throws herself between the spray and her daughter. D's body jerks left and then right as two bullets lodge in her stomach.

D clutches her bleeding stomach with two hands and staggers back against the wall as E takes cover. Blood oozes through the woman's splayed fingers. "Mama!" E yells.

The door bursts open with a kick and a spray of splintered wood. Thomas and Carol both open fire on the entering sisters.

Four sisters fall dead to the ground. Thomas runs over the fallen bodies, successfully firing at two more armed sisters. Carol's never seen him use a rifle before, but he's quick, and his aim is precise, and he takes them both down before either can squeeze off a shot. It's no wonder Garland made him a deputy years ago.

Carol abandons the unreliable, jamming handgun and takes a rifle off a fallen sister instead. She steps over a fallen body and into the hall, sweeping left and then right. When Thomas emerges behind her, she says, "I'll clear right, you clear left." He nods and they go opposite directions.

She makes her way cautiously down the short hallway and then turns a corner into another with her rifle ready. The door to a staircase at the far end of the hall slams open, and a sister emerges, swiveling her rifle toward Carol. Carol shoots twice, instinctively, but hears only the tell-tale click of a dry fire each time.

She should have checked that the rifle still had ammunition.

[*]

"Oh no!" Daryl exclaims quietly.

Sweetheart's too tired now to echo his line.

"Chicka chika boom boom!" he whispers. "Skit skat skoodle doot."

Sweetheart tugs harder at her left ear. Her eyelids droop all the way closed.

"Flip flop flee. Everybody running to the coconut tree."

[*]

Carol anticipates the searing pain of the sister's gunfire, but it doesn't come, because a domestic in the hallway shoots the woman. Where did he come from? Where did he get that rifle? It's the man who was serving her water at dinner tonight, the one E smiled at affectionately.

"Are you rebelling?" he asks.

Carol, trying to clear the haze of adrenaline flooding her body, blinks. "Yes." She begins to take in the scene in the hallway as the domestic lowers the rifle. There are _two_ fallen sisters – the one the domestic just shot, and another in an open doorway. She's had her head bashed against the doorframe. Red-brown blood drips down the white wood and sinks into the brown industrial carpet.

Carol's not sure exactly what happened here, but she thinks the sister was probably locking the domestics into their rooms for the night. This man was the last to be led inside a room. When Carol's gunshots from the bedroom distracted the sister, the domestic must have seized his chance to smash her against the doorframe and grab her rifle.

Thomas now rushes into the hallway, swiveling his rifle toward the domestic. Carol shouts, "Don't shoot him!" Thomas eases his finger away from the trigger. "He's with us," Carol explains. "Go defend from the foyer. They'll be coming in from the other building." Thomas nods and jogs off.

Carol throws aside the empty rifle and runs to pick up the fallen sister's instead. She slides out the magazine to check it this time. The brass glints in the light of the setting sun. "Go into apartment sixteen and help the women," Carol tells the surviving domestic as she reloads. "Your girlfriend's in there. Her mother's been shot."

The man thunders down the hallway, while Carol bolts toward the gunshots that are now echoing in the foyer.

Thomas is there, breathing hard and looking at three fallen sisters. "Were you shot?" Carol asks. There's a hole in his shirt, where it billows out a little at the side.

He laughs a little deliriously and puts his finger in the hole. "It went right through. Right through the shirt and didn't even graze me. Must be that lucky rabbit's foot Candy gave me!" Thomas looks toward the front door of the building. "How many are there? Do you know?"

"Thirteen sisters." She shoulders her rifle. "Zami's down. Lilith." She holds out her fingers one by one as she counts. "The four who tried to burst into the bedroom. The two you shot in the living room. The one that domestic shot in the hallway. The one he bashed against the door frame." All ten of her fingers are up now. "And these three."

"Then there's none left," Thomas says.

The very last rays of the sinking sun flicker over the tiled entryway of the foyer, and Carol laughs in relief.

[*]

"And the sun goes down on the coconut tree," Daryl whispers to Sweetheart, whose eyes are now fully closed. He closes the book very carefully and lays it gently aside. He scoops Sweetheart into the cradle of his arms, and ever so slowly rises from the couch.

He walks through the cabin, which is illuminated only by the single oil lamp he lit in anticipation of the sunset, and lays her on her bed. Daryl pulls the thin sheet up and tucks it under her little chin before lowering his head to press his lips against her silky, soft brown hair. "Nite, nite, baby girl."


	182. Chapter 182

When Carol and Thomas return to the apartment where the taming was supposed to take place, a body lies wrapped tenderly in a bedsheet in the hallway before the open front door. Inside, the sisters' guns have all been collected, and the ones that weren't shot in the head have been stabbed so they won't turn. Carol can hear weeping from the apartment next door. She and Thomas go over there and find the sisters' rifles leaned against the loveseat where the domestic sits with his arm around E, who is crying against his shoulder. He startles and reaches for a rifle when they enter but relaxes when he sees who it is.

The fireplace has been lit and illuminates the room. Postulant A sits in an armchair, her knee nervously bouncing up and down while she cracks her knuckles and stares at the carpet. She looks up at Thomas. "I'm so sorry!" she says. "I'm so sorry. I wasn't going to go through with it, I swear."

Thomas says nothing and firmly grits his jaw.

"Zami was forcing her to do it," Carol tells him. "But she refused and dropped the knife. That gave me a chance to pick it up and kill the leader."

Thomas's face softens.

"Did you get them all?" the domestic asks.

Carol nods. "Thirteen sisters. There aren't any more than that, are there?"

"No," he answers. He sighs. "Kaitlyn's mother didn't make it." The body in the bedsheet, Carol thinks. "We'll have to bury her. I'm Devon." He squeezes E by the shoulders. "And this is Kaitlyn."

"I'm Carol," Carol says.

"Thomas." Thomas gives them all a little wave. Then he slings his rifle on his shoulder and finally snaps his pants and buckles his still loose belt.

"And I'm Laura," A says, her voice stronger than Carol's heard it yet. Her eyes move shyly from the carpet to Thomas's eyes. "Really…I'm _sorry_." Her voice cracks as if she's about to cry.

"Just so you know," Thomas tells her, "it was cold in that room."

The joke relieves Laura, and she smiles. That little twitch of her mouth brightens her brown eyes. She stops bouncing her leg.

Thomas smiles back. "Hey," he says softly, "You didn't go through with it. Even though it probably would have meant your death if Carol wasn't there."

"Can we let my dad out of his room now?" Kaitlyn asks. She sniffles and uses the back of her hand to wipe the tears from her cheeks.

"And my brother?" Laura asks.

"We'll let all the slaves out," Carol says.

Laura shakes her head. "No. Her father, my brother, and maybe those three men that just came here last month. They spied the camp and came looking for help for C. She was injured. The sisters took care of her. Treated her and stitched her up, but then…" Laura swallows. "You know the rest."

"Why not the other men?" Carol asks.

"The rest of the domestics were from Zami's original camp at Cape Charles," Laura explains, "and as far as I'm concerned, you can leave them in their rooms to starve to death and rot. They used to keep Zami and the other original sisters as sex slaves. I think they turned those women into what they are. What they _were_."

"That's what _they_ said those men did," Devon replies. "You don't know those men actually did that. You know those freaks call it rape every time - "

"- How else do you think they could have become like this?" Laura interrupts.

"We'll let out just those five for now," Carol says, "and we'll discuss what to do with the rest later."

[*]

Carol holds the lamp as Devon hacks away at the padlock on one of the apartment doors.

"Stop!" Laura says. "Just try a combination!"

"We don't know the combination," Kaitlyn reasons as Devon stands back from the lock to give Laura a puzzled look. "It would take forever to guess."

"Try 8, 18, 20," Laura insists.

Devon does, and the padlock clicks free. "How the hell did you know that? Have you seen them put it in?"

"I just guessed. It's the date they ratified the 19th amendment. August 18, 1920. Zami was always talking about it, how late in history it was."

"What's the 19th amendment?" Devon asks, and it occurs to Carol that the young man was probably only in 7th or 8th grade when the apocalypse started, and apparently he doesn't remember his Civics education, if he even got one.

"The right to vote," Thomas says. "For women."

"Oh," Devon murmurs. "You think they _all_ have that combo?"

Laura shrugs. "We can try."

"Daddy!" Kaitlyn yells through the door. "It's me and Devon. The sisters are dead. It's safe. We're coming in!"

Devon pushes open the door and Carol shines the lamp inside. Kaitylyn's gray-haired father blinks. It is the same man who made up Carol's bed and dusted her furniture. He's dressed in sweat pants and a white t-shirt and when he raises his hand to shield his eyes against the light, that's when Carol sees the number tattooed on the back of his hand – thirteen. "Dead?" he asks.

"We're free, Daddy!" Kaitlyn says, throwing her arms around him. Looking shocked, he encircles his daughter with his arms.

After a moment, the man pulls back. "Where's your mother?"

Kaitlyn bursts into tears.

[*]

Daryl sits in the rocking chair out in back of his cabin and looks at the stars. The windows are open so he can hear Sweetheart if she awakens, and Dog's in there, keeping watch over her. He'll bark if she wakes up. But Daryl just needed the air and the calm of the night sky. The way Sweetheart said, "Mamma uh-oh" tonight got him all worked up inside. There's a foreign worry clawing at his chest. He never used to _worry_ like this. Is this what it means, having a family? That you worry about them all the time? It's worse than fighting walkers, this feeling.

He's glad for the distraction when Garland strolls by and asks if he can join him. He's even gladder when Garland slides into the second rocking chair and pulls a flask out of his front shirt pocket and asks, "Want a little nip?"

"Hell yeah."

Garland hands over the flask. As Daryl sips, the mayor says, "Gunther found Gary up a tree in the orchard today. He'd almost climbed to the very top, where the branches could barely support him. We had to get a ladder to get him down because he couldn't figure out how to do it backward. That kid's as wild as a rattlesnake."

Daryl hands back the flask. "Ain't a bad thing in this world. He'll be brave enough to deal with shit."

"If he _lives_ to deal with it. He's not at all circumspect. No caution in that boy at all." Garland sighs and shakes his head. "Sometimes I look at him, and I don't see any part of myself in him." Garland's voice grows quiet. "Sometimes, it hits me like a slap in the face that he's another man's child."

"Bullshit!" Daryl barks.

"Well you know he is."

"Pfft. Just some guy knocked Shannon up. Weren't his _father_. 'N I mean bullshit that Gary ain't got any of you in 'em. 'S got yer generosity. 'S always givin' Sweetheart his toys. He don't have to do that."

"Yeah. That's kind of him. _I'm_ not generous like that though."

Daryl chuffs. "Says the man who let me 'n m'wife live in his cabin for months. And who just offered me his whiskey. 'N who watches m'kid when I need 'em to."

"How's that going? The single dad thing?"

Daryl stretches out his hand and wiggles his fingers.

Garland smiles and slides the flask back into his hand. "That badly huh?"

Daryl takes another swig, lowers the flask, and says, "Nah. 'S been a'right. Just…startin' to realize how much shit Carol does every day."

Garland nods. "They are efficient creatures, women. Some of them anyway. _Ours._ And beautiful. And soft. _"_ He smiles a little dopily. "They smell good too. Better than us anyway."

"Think ya've had more than a nip of this."

"Maybe," Garland admits.

"Why ain't ya home with yers then?"

"Shannon told me I should go for a walk."

Daryl echoes Sweetheart's favorite phrase: "Uh oh."

"No. There's nothing wrong. Things have been good between us. She just wants some time to herself without me pestering her for sex."

Daryl chuckles.

"The boys are in bed," Garland continues. "She's got a good book. And the last glass of our wine. Who knows? Maybe she'll be feeling affectionate when I get back."

"Not if yer drunk, she won't," Daryl tells him. "I better finish this off for you." He takes the last little sip of whiskey in the flask and screws the lid back on.

[*]

Next they let out Laura's brother Don. The combination works on his padlock, too.

"I'm surprised they gave everyone their own apartment," Thomas says to Laura as they stroll down the hallway in the glow of the lamp. "As inhumane as they are, I figured they'd pack you in like sardines."

"They didn't want us conspiring," Laura says. "Besides, the loneliness has a better chance of breaking you mentally. It almost broke me."

"Is that woman who cut of my balls dead?" Don asks.

"They're all dead," Laura tells her brother. "Carol and Thomas here killed them all. Well, Devon got two."

"Devon, that's your name?" Don asks the former slave. "I just knew you by number." He holds out his hand. "I'm Don."

The two men shake.

As they continue down the hall, Thomas tells Laura, "You're going to like our town."

Carol shoots him a warning look, because they haven't actually agreed to take these people back with them yet. Thomas looks penitently at the hallway carpet.

"Your _town_?" Laura asks. "There's no such thing as a _town_ left in this world."

Thomas changes the subject. "Which room is the next one we're looking for? We're letting out three more men, right?"

"Here." Devon comes to a stop before the door. "This is one of the newest ones. From last month." He begins turning the combination lock, and it clicks open.

The sisters did use just one combination. Laura could have let all these men out by night, Carol thinks, and they could have quietly killed the sisters in their sleep, at least all except the one on guard at the gate and the one on guard in the foyer. But maybe not everyone thinks like she does. It was probably all the courage Laura could summon not to go through with Thomas's castration. After all, she had to know there would be grave consequences for revealing that her brainwashing had failed.

Carol raises her lamp as Thomas pushes open the door. She startles at the unexpected sound of a growl, and the lamp shakes. A walker gnashes its jaws where it hangs kicking from a bedsheet tied to the ceiling fan. Thomas goes inside, rights the kicked over stool, and climbs up to stab the walker in the forehead. He doesn't bother to cut it down. When he comes out, he closes the door quietly behind himself.

"We've all wanted to do it," Don murmurs. "I tried twice. I just couldn't get the blades to hold my weight long enough. But fifteen was a skinny fellow."

The next man is alive. He says his name is Avery, and he thanks them for freeing him, but then he asks about his wife. "They called her C."

Carol swallows. "She's dead."

"How?" Avery cries.

"She tried to shoot me, so I had to shoot her."

"You _killed_ her?" Avery lunges for Carol. Thomas and Devon wrestle him to the ground.

"She was too far gone, man," Devon tells him as they pin him, bucking, in place. "She was brainwashed into it. She tried to kill Carol instead of joining her."

"No. No," Avery insists. "She would have wanted to be free!"

"It's true," Laura tells him. She nods to Kaitlyn. "We were there. We saw it."

It takes a while, but Avery calms down, hears them out, and then asks about his brother John and his cousin Tony.

"Whichever one was fifteen," Devon tells him reluctantly, "he killed himself."

Avery closes his eyes. He swallows, and when he opens them again, he asks, in a shaky voice, "And Tony?"

"We haven't let seventeen out yet," Devon says.

They go to the room Avery leads them to, and his cousin Tony is still alive.

"We need to bury our wives now," Kaityln's father Joe tells Carol. "Please. Give Avery that closure, too, even if his wife did try to kill you."

[*]

They bury C and D, whose real names were Jennifer and Kate, in the grass-pocked earth at the far end of the first apartment building. They dig shallow graves beneath a three-quarter moon and roll the bodies inside. Joe says a prayer.

When they're done covering the graves, they walk wearily back to the apartment building to find some water. As they enter the foyer, however, led by the glow of a single oil lantern, they're suddenly surrounded by the barrels of seven rifles.


	183. Chapter 183

The guns came from out of nowhere in the dusk of the foyer. Four men must have been molded to either side of the front door of the building, and three more sprang up from behind the entryway desk. Carol didn't have a moment to reach for the rifle dangling on her shoulder. Her heart is beating in the cage of her throat when Santiago's voice drifts on the darkness: "Is that _you_ , Carol?"

"It's me!" she cries with relief. "Guns up. Everyone here's safe."

There are sighs of relief all around as guns are shouldered. Santiago walks out from behind the desk and into the halo of the oil lamp's light to peer at Carol and assure himself it's really her. "We scaled the fence," he says. "There were no guards at all. So we spilt up to clear the whole place. Lieutenant Alvarado and a few others are checking the clubhouse. And – Thomas!" Santiago strides forward, hugs Thomas, and pats him on the back. When Thomas draws away, Santiago glances down. "Still got your balls?"

"Thank God, yes. Actually, I thank Carol."

"We found a couple of dead women when we were clearing." Santiago jerks his head towards the direction where Devon rebelled. "One looked like she had her head bashed in. And men are shouting from inside of the rooms, but they're all padlocked. We wanted to find you before we let them out. We spied movement through the window, saw you were coming in with guns on your shoulders, but we couldn't tell who it was. So we got in place."

"You would have had us if we'd been the enemy," Carol admits. She doesn't like to think she's that vulnerable, but she also wouldn't like to think Jamestown's soldiers weren't on top of things. She reassures herself that she would have entered more cautiously if she wasn't already sure she'd cleared the threat in this building. "We killed them all. Everyone who was a threat anyway. Not the slaves. These two women were being brainswashed into the cult." She motions from Kaitlyn to Laura. "But they helped us. We need to talk."

Santiago orders one of his men to find Lt. Alvarado and the other men and tell them to hold their fire and meet them in the foyer. Laura's brother Don flanks her, and he looks suspiciously from Santiago to the other armed men. Devon puts a protective, possessive arm around Kaitlyn, and her father Joe molds to her other side. Meanwhile, Tony and Avery stand whispering to one other.

The waiting is tense. Carol introduces everyone by name in the meantime. Lieutenant Alvarado eventually marches into the foyer with three other men. He looks mightily relieved to see Thomas and Carol. "We found the horses," he says. "They're keeping them in the changing stalls by the pool. I left Harry to graze and water them. And our cart was in the parking lot."

A sailor's stomach growls. "Can we finally have super now?" he asks.

"We didn't stop to eat while we were marching," Lt. Alvarado explains.

"We'll show you where there's food," Kaitlyn says, stepping out from under the protective arm of her boyfriend.

[*]

While most of the men are taken to eat, Santiago, Lt. Alvarado, Carol, and Thomas go off to an empty apartment to confer. They'll have to serve as an impromptu council. Two of them – Carol and Thomas – are already councilmembers. Lt. Alvarado is the highest-ranking navy officer on the scene, and Santiago is always acting sheriff in Earl's absence, so it seems reasonable they should be the decision-makers.

"Sarah didn't come?" Carol asks. They stand huddled by the kitchen counter, where they've rested an oil lamp.

"She's playing guard back at the salt ponds," Santiago says. "The lieutenant wanted to leave some workmen there so we wouldn't lose too much time on the mining. I tried to talk him into bringing more men. I said twelve wouldn't be enough."

"And you were wrong." Lt. Alvarado casts an admiring smile in Carol's direction. " _One_ was enough. She took the whole place down by herself. I guess Shannon's going to have to update that museum display."

"I had help," Carol insists. She doesn't like being admired quite so much for her ability to kill. She hates that the world is still a place where that's considered a person's greatest virtue. "Thomas shot six of them. A domestic killed two. And a postulant took a bullet for me." If B hadn't rushed C…that would have been the end of her.

"A domestic?" Santiago asks. "A postulant?"

Carol sighs. "It's a long story." She makes it as short as she can while the lieutenant and Santiago eat snacks from their packs to replace their lost meal. Thomas joins them, because he didn't eat the food Zami offered him after capturing him and before strapping him to that bed. He feared it might be drugged or poisoned.

Santiago and the lieutenant listen as they eat, and their eyes widen at various points of the story.

Lt. Alvarado winces when she's done. "All those men are castrated? _Completely_?"

"Just they're balls are cut off," Thomas says.

"Just!" Lt. Alvarado exclaims.

"Those sisters did worse if you tried to rebel," Thomas explains. "The cannibals we found mutilated? They tried to rebel. The sisters cut off their dicks – " He glances apologetically at Carol, "excuse my French." Carol tries not to laugh. She just killed eight people, but he's worried about her delicate ears. On the other hand, that tiny touch of civilization is almost endearing. "Then they threw them out. They probably died of infection. Either from the wounds or from not being able to piss."

Lt. Alvarado and Santiago both pinch their legs protectively together.

"We have to decide what to do with those men who are still locked in their rooms," Carol says. "They may or may not have done what Zami told the postulants they did."

Lt. Alvarado relaxes his defensive posture but shakes his head. "I'm not comfortable bringing potential rapists back to Jamestown. Even if they _have_ been castrated and their testosterone levels are low now."

"Devon's castrated and he still managed to smash one of those women's brains out against a door," Thomas says. "It can't take away all the drive to violence. I agree with you. If there's a chance they did what that Laura says they did? I don't even want them to know where we live."

"Well we can't just kill them all, either," Santiago says.

"Who said anything about killing?" Thomas asks. "I say we take Laura, her brother Don. Devon, Kaitlyn, and her father Joe. We leave the rest behind and we don't tell them where we've gone."

"We take Avery and Tony, too," Carol tells him. "They only came here last month. They're the newest ones. They certainly weren't any part of whatever happened at Cape Charles."

"But Avery's wife tried to kill you," Thomas says, "and then Avery tried to kill you."

"She was brainwashed, and he was grieving and confused to learn she was dead," Carol reasons. "He's settled down. I say we bring him and his cousin, too."

Thomas shrugs. "If you're okay with it…okay."

"And are you sure you want to bring that woman who almost cut off your balls?" Santiago ask Thomas.

"Laura didn't, though," Thomas replies. "She risked her life by dropping that knife."

"So we just leave the rest behind?" the lieutenant asks. "Take those seven, loot the place, and leave the rest to sink or swim here? Is that the plan?"

"We can unlock their rooms just before we go," Carol says, "and leave behind some of the produce and knives for the walkers. By the time they investigate what happened, we'll be gone. There's no reason for them to leave this place. They have the gardens. They have fences. They have walls."

"So we're agreed?" Thomas asks. "We take those seven with us and leave the rest behind?" He raises his hand.

The other three members of the impromptu council do the same.

[*]

Except for the watch, everyone catches four hours of sleep. When the sun rises over the river in the nearby shipyard, Jamestown begins loading up the cart. The last two men they released – Avery and his cousin Tony – are reticent to join their rescuers.

"No offense," Avery tells Thomas, because he can't bring himself to look at Carol after she killed his wife, "but the sisters seemed welcoming at first, too. We'd just as soon stay here. If you'd leave us all the produce, we'd have a good chance. And if you'd leave us each a couple of rifles and two hundred rounds of ammunition, we'll wait until you're gone to let those other men out. If they turn out to be trouble…" Avery shrugs. "Well, we'll be armed and they won't."

The impromptu Jamestown council meets again and agrees to leave behind _half_ the produce (after all, the population here has been more than cut in half), two rifles, and sixty rounds of ammunition each. They don't want to leave them _too_ well armed, not forty miles from their own doorstep, not with those uncertain men behind locked doors. "Besides," Thomas says, "I feel like we've earned the loot."

When they announce their decision, Don says, "Laura and I will stay here, too."

"No we won't!" Laura cries. "Are you kidding?"

"We can't trust these people," Don tells her.

"They _freed_ us!"

"Better a bird in hand," her brother tells her. "We _know_ we have food here and gardens to grow more. We know we have gates and walls. And we know we have no oppressors."

"We don't know what those men are like behind those doors when they aren't being kept in line by the sisters," Laura reasons. "If they did what Zami says they did – "

"- Even if they did," Don interrupts, "they don't have the balls to do it anymore. _Literally._ And if they try to hurt you in anyway, I swear to you I'll put them down."

"You can't protect me alone, Don. You _didn't_."

Don grits his teeth and his eyes darken.

"I need to protect myself by making smart decisions. And the smart decision is to go with these people. They have an army."

"For all you know," he glances suspiciously from Thomas to Santiago to Lt. Alvarado, "you're going to show up at their camp, and they're going to turn you into a sex slave and put me to work in their fields."

"If they wanted to hurt us, they would have done it already!" Laura says.

"Look," Lt. Alvarado interrupts, "Come or don't come. We don't care. But we're pulling out in less than hour."

"I'm going with them," Laura says determinedly.

"Then you're going without me," Don tells her.

"Please don't do that. Please, Don. You're my _brother_."

"I'm staying here. You either trust me and stay with me or you take your chances on a bunch of strangers. Now which do you think is really the _smartest_?"

[*]

In addition to collecting half the ripe fruits and vegetables from the gardens, and lots of guns and ammo, Jamestown takes some oil, lamps, a scythe, two machetes, and all the salvageable clothing from the dead sisters. They leave the chickens for the men they're leaving behind, but they take all the freshly lain eggs to eat for lunch and supper today, and they kill two of the eight rabbits and store them in a cooler to roast later.

In the room where Avery's friend committed suicide, Carol removes the boots from the dead dangling walker. They're Daryl's size, and they're sturdy after all.

When Carol comes out of the room, Thomas and Laura are emerging from her former bedroom. She's packed and collected her few things – the postulants weren't allowed much – and will be joining them without her brother.

"The sisters must have had liquor stashed somewhere," Laura tells Thomas. "They served it at the banquets they held whenever a postulant would become a sister. I was here long enough to see three of those."

"Three?" Thomas asks.

She nods. "The one they held when my brother was castrated, the one they held when Devon and Joe were castrated, and the one they held when Avery and Tony and that other man…" She glances at the room Carol has just exited. She sighs. "I don't even know his name."

[*]

They find the stash of alcohol in a padlocked storage room in the clubhouse. The combination doesn't work on this one, so Carol ends up shooting off the lock. It takes two bullets, but fortunately, the expenditure doesn't turn out to be a waste, because they find twelve entire _cases_ of wine, eleven bottles of whiskey, eight bottles of vodka, and five bottles of rum.

"Linda's going to be thrilled to have her inventory restocked!" Thomas says.

"Who's Linda?" Laura asks.

"Our tavernkeeper."

"Your…you have a _tavern_?"

Thomas grins. "Wait until to you see it!" He carries out a case of wine.

As Carol is slipping a single bottle of vodka into her pack – this will be her finder's fee – Laura says, "Your husband is really nice."

"What?"

"Thomas. He's really nice." She nods to Carol's Cherokee Rose cameo ring. "That's a pretty ring he gave you."

Carol chuckles as she zips the pack. Thomas can't be more than thirty-three. "Oh, no, Thomas isn't my husband. My husband is fifty." Seventeen years older but much better looking than Thomas, Carol thinks, though she doesn't say that. Not that Thomas is unattractive, but he's average. Average height, average build, average, brown eyes, average features. Only the smattering of freckles on his face and the slight red hue to his brown hair are out of the ordinary.

"But…you risked your life to save him!" Laura exclaims.

"Well, he's a friend."

Laura blinks. "You'd do that for a _friend_?"

Carol situates her rifle on her shoulder. "Thomas is my people. I'm a deputy and councilperson in our town. So is Thomas. He's also a field medic. He's a valuable resource, as well as a friend."

Laura glances over her shoulder in the direction Thomas has departed. "He's one of your town's leaders?"

"For now at least. Elections are in four weeks."

" _Elections_?" Laura laughs. She shakes her head. "Thank you. Thank you for rescuing us and taking us to your world."

"Well, make it up to us with your talents, whatever those are," Carol tells her, and she picks up a case of wine and heads for the cart.

[*]

The cart is full to the rims when they're done loading it, and they have to add a trailer to the back of it. Devon and Joe show them where they can find a flat dolly on wheels with wooden sides, and they fill that, too, and hitch it to the already bursting cart. The rest of the loot is slipped into hiking packs.

Thomas drives the horses and invites Laura to sit beside him on the driver's bench. Freckles and Lancelot will move slowly with all this loot to pull, but not any slower than the humans marching on foot. The two men who kept watch last night and never got any sleep add to the weight. They lie on top of a pile of clothes at the foot of the cart, with their heads on the pillow of their packs, and sleep while the group sets off marching.

Carol's exhausted when she closes the gate and takes up the rear of the group, behind the dolly, so she can make sure it doesn't swing loose or get stuck. She'll nap for an hour or two on the ship when they're back at the salt ponds, she thinks, and then join in the mining or help keep watch. The miners will work until sunset. They'll wake again in the morning and work a few more hours before they all sail back to Jamestown with their bounty.

They should be home by sunset tomorrow. Carol can't wait to tuck in her baby girl and then sink into her own couch to share a shot of vodka with Daryl.


	184. Chapter 184

Early the next morning, as soon as they daycare opens, Daryl deposits Sweetheart and goes hunting with Mitch. He picks up his daughter in the afternoon, and they head for the new playground that Dante has recently completed in the field outside the fort's bulwark. Dante's going to be a father soon, and he thought the town should have one. Since Inola is on the Council, he had a bit of an "in," and he got the building plan approved, even though Carolyn and Barry both suggested it might be a waste of time and resources.

But there the playground stands – with a swingset consisting of two rope swings with wooden seats and two tire swings, a set of wooden monkey bars, a pair of uneven bars, a sand box, a stand-alone metal slide attached to a ladder, and a small maze made from truck tires that kids can crawl through and climb on top of. Sweetheart toddles to the sandbox with glee, crawls inside, sits on her bottom, and takes the blue plastic shovel VanDaryl hands her. Gary is busy burying his matchbox cars.

Daryl sits down at the picnic bench in the shade of the lone tree, where Garland is already sitting and watching his boys. Dante, who has been sanding the parallel bars, joins them, dropping his heavy tool belt in a puddle on the ground. He slides onto the bench and opens a canteen of water he's left on the table. "Y'all know the grand opening of the playground is supposed to be _tomorrow_ , right?" Dante asks just before he takes a swig of water.

"Looks done," Daryl grunts.

Dante shrugs as the neck of the canteen slurps from his mouth. "I still need to sand down some rough edges, so don't bitch to me if your kids get splinters."

Daryl nods to the graveyard. The playground is built only a few yards away, because this is the best open area – in the roomy field outside the original fences of the fort, but still within the defensive fences of Jamestown. "Interesting view."

"I think it's a beautiful contrast," Garland muses. "Laughter among the tombstones. An image of life triumphing over death."

"English major," Dante mutters to Daryl, who snorts.

Gary shakes the sand off one of his cars and runs for the slide. He climbs the ladder expertly for a child of only four and pushes the car down. Then he climbs stomach first onto the slide after it. "Careful!" his father yells to him. "Not headfirst!"

"Headfirst!" Gary yells back.

"I said _not_ head – oh, never mind," Garland trails off as Gary goes sliding headfirst down the slide, lands on his hands on the ground, and somersaults off the bottom, smacking down on the hard dirt below with a thud. "Did that hurt?" Garland calls.

"No!" Gary insists, but he lies there for a good stunned minute before he pulls himself up and goes back to the sand box.

"Didn't volunteer for the mining?" Daryl asks Dante.

"Hell no. Inola could pop any week now," Dante answers.

"How's she?"

"Tired," Dante answers. "She'll be glad when our boy's here."

"Or girl," Garland reminds him.

"You just say girl because you want another wife option for your boys one day," Dante tells him. "You don't want them _both_ fighting each other over Sweetheart."

"What?" Daryl barks, and Dante laughs.

Garland smiles slightly. "There are other little girls in town. Jeremy and Olivia just had a girl. Hope."

"And Sheriff Earl just had a boy to chase her," Dante says. "If they don't grow up thinking they're brother and sister in some weird, two-father, divided-house family."

"There's Mia," Garland says. "She's four like Gary. And Indra. She's seven. Too old for VanDaryl, but not for Gary's once he's eighteen. There's Lily. And our world is growing. There are also kids at Oceanside. Alexandria. The Hilltop."

"Ya think 'bout this shit?" Daryl asks. "Who yer kid's gonna marry?"

"Don't you?" Garland asks.

"She ain't even two!"

Dante chuckles. "I can't wait to watch you when she's sixteen, man. It's gonna be like Jamestown having its own situational comedy TV show."

Daryl glowers.

Dante changes the subject. "What did the doc say?" he asks Garland. "About VanDaryl?" When Garland looks mildly shocked, Dante explains, "Shannon told me you were getting his hearing tested."

Garland sighs. "Yeah. We're just worried, you know. He turned fourteen months, and still not a single word. Dr. Ahmad said he's deaf in one ear. That wasn't the case when he tested his hearing when he was born, so he must have been losing it gradually."

"Shit," Daryl mutters. "But he can still hear fine in the other ear?"

"For now," Garland replies. "The doctor has no idea why he lost it in the left ear, though. The right ear could follow for all we know. But at any rate, the doc says that's probably not the only reasons he's not talking. He can hear himself well enough to be babbling and to make words."

"Then why ain't he?" Daryl asks.

Garland shrugs. "Dr. Ahamad doesn't know. He told us to relax and give it time, that maybe he's just a late talker."

"Da da!" Sweetheart shouts. "Da da dig!"

"That's a new word," Garland says with a hint of jealousy. "Dig."

"Yeah," Daryl says sympathetically as he stands. He strolls over to the sandbox to join his little girl, and soon Garland's sitting on the edge of the box by VanDaryl, too. Dante goes back to work sanding the parallel bars.

"Ya want my baby sign language book?" Daryl asks Garland as he takes the shovel Sweetheart hands him.

"Yeah. I should probably get a _real_ one, though, on ASL. I hope there's one in the library."

"If there ain't," Daryl tells him. "I'll go scavengin' at the public library."

"You don't have to do that, Daryl. I appreciate it, but you – "

"-Hey," Daryl interrupts. "VanDaryl's m'godson. Got m'name. Can get the damn book for ya."

[*]

Carol drives a shovel into the damp, soft earth just outside a salt pond. She doesn't understand how this procedure works, but she trusts the instructions of the two miners in charge of the project. The Jamestown team has already pumped four freshly dug evaporation pools full of water from the salt ponds, and now they're all digging more.

"So what's the point of all this work?" Joe asks Carol as he drives his shovel into the ground and leans on it.

"We're mining lithium for use in solar batteries," Carol explains. "So when the batteries from the old world finally stop working in a year or two, we'll have new ones for the Alliance's speedboat and backup batteries for our own solar panels."

" _Alliance_?" Devon asks. He, too, stops digging and rests on his shovel.

"You have _power_?" Kaitlyn asks. She already stopped digging a moment ago to have a drink of water.

"And a speedboat?" Laura echoes as she lays her shovel aside and Kaitlyn passes her the canteen.

"We only have some power, in our – " Thomas stops midsentence and mid-shovel and glances at Carol.

"You can tell them. They're coming back with us. No point in keeping it a secret now." Carol just didn't want the ones they left behind to know where they were going.

Thomas drives his shovel into the ground, leans on it, and explains the riches of Jamestown. Carol takes this opportunity to rest and have a drink of water as well, since she's the only one in her work group still digging at this point.

Devon whistles when Thomas is done. "Your brother made a shit decision not coming," he tells Laura.

"I know," Laura says gloomily.

"We have to come back to get the lithium after the evaporation," Thomas tells her. "In October. I'll volunteer for that trip. You can come with me. We'll check on your brother together."

"Maybe I could persuade him to join us then?" Laura says hopefully.

"We'll try," Thomas promises her as he unhitches his canteen from his belt and unscrews the cap.

"Don't get yourself captured again," Carol warns.

Thomas looks embarrassed. "Sorry for all the trouble I caused," he murmurs.

Laura smiles at him. "I'm glad you caused it. I'm glad we're _free_."

"Well, I'm not glad my wife's dead," Joe mutters through clenched teeth.

Laura swallows and looks down at the muddy earth.

"Would you rather still be a slave?" Thomas asks him.

Joe waves his hand around at the salt bonds. "This work isn't any easier. And at least my wife would be alive."

"You can always go back," Thomas tells him coolly. "With Laura's brother and the others. If that's what you prefer. I'll take you right now."

"Daddy!" Kaitlyn warns. "They have a _town_."

"I don't want to go back," Joe mutters. "I'm just…" His voice chokes. "My wife is dead."

"So is my mother," Kaityln tells him gently. "You're not the only one grieving, you know. And she died saving me."

Joe runs a hand across the gray stubble on his cheeks to swipe away a stray tear, and then he changes the subject. "Where will we stay in Jamestown?" he asks Carol.

"The council will assign you rooms after we confer," Carol explains as she twists her cap back onto her canteen and clips it to her belt. "But I'm guessing Devon and Kaitlyn will be given the old library." Now that Jeremy and Olivia are living with their baby in a divided half of Earl's cabin, that room is free.

"They don't need to share a private room," Joe insists.

"Daddy," Kaitlyn says, "I hate to break it to you, but Devon and I started sleeping together weeks before we got captured."

Joe glares at Devon, who busies himself with clipping his canteen back on his belt.

"Well," Joe says. "It's not going to be the same _now_ , you know."

"I don't care about that," Kaitlyn insists.

"You will," Devon mutters as he jerks his shovel out of the ground.

"No, I won't," she assures him. "Besides, you can still get an – "

Devon flushes and nods his head toward Joe, and Kaitlyn falls silent.

"There's also a spare room in the dorms," Thomas says to break up the awkward conversation. He doesn't mention how that vacancy was created – by Gunther killing Edgar. "And then there's the old barracks, too. I just finished turning them into an apartment for myself, because they want a medic near the fort, but it's really big for one person. I could easily put up a wall down the middle and subdivide it into tow apartments, if one of you wanted half." He glances at Laura. "There are entrances and fireplaces on both sides. You'd have your privacy."

Laura smiles.

"Back to work boys and girls!" shouts the foreman and head miner. He paces around the growing evaporation pond. "Only two hours of daylight left! Stop lollygagging! We want to sail home tonight!"

[*]

Daryl lasted about ten minutes at the park once Garland and the boys left. It became pretty tedious pretty quickly without the adult company, and he was getting tired of Sweetheart sliding off the wooden seat of the swing within two pushes every single time and then asking to be lifted back up onto it. So now they're down at the docks, looking at the waterbugs scurry on the surface of the rippling water as the sun grows lower, but really Daryl's looking for a sign of Carol's ship sailing up the river. He keeps shading his eyes with his hand and peering south.

Finally, he shouts up to Captain McBride, who's mending a net on the deck of the _Susan Constant_. "See anything?" He knows the man has a telescope up there.

McBride drops the net he's working on and pulls the compacted telescope out of his pants pocket and extends it to scour the horizon. He looks back down at Daryl with a shake of his head. "No. I'm sure they'll be back soon."

"Supposed to be back early this afternoon!" Daryl shouts up.

"The mining must have taken longer than expected!" McBride booms back. "Or maybe they found some really good loot and had to spend time fetching it. We can always hope!"

Daryl does hope. He hopes it's one of those two reasons and not something sinister as Sweetheart looks up at him, makes the baby sign for more, and says, "Ungwy!"

Another new word, Daryl thinks. Carol's missed at least twelve. He crouches down, swoops her up onto his shoulders as she snorts and giggles, and rises holding her steady by her legs. She puts her hands atop of his head for perch, and he begins walking down the docks back to their cabin for dinner.


	185. Chapter 185

Carol's still not home after Daryl cleans up the plates from dinner. She's not home after he straightens the cabin for her – which is to say he sweeps the mud from his boots into a corner. She's not home after he reads three books to Sweetheart and tucks her into her bed and presses his lips down on her forehead.

"Mama?" Sweetheart asks when he pulls away.

"Mama be home tomorrow morning," he promises, though he has no idea if that's actually true. If it's not – he'll give her until 11 AM – and if she's not back, hell, he'll leave Sweetheart with the Barrons and take a goddamn canoe and paddle his way the forty miles downriver to Hampton.

His promise must be convincing, because Sweetheart closes her eyes and rolls onto her side. Daryl whistles Dog over, and he leaps up onto the toddler's bed and lies at the foot of it, ready to rip the throat out of any monster that would dare try to upset her in the night. Sweetheart kicks as she falls asleep, and Dog takes the blow with aplomb, but shifts his position a little lower down the bed.

"Good dog," Daryl tells him, and scratches behind his ears before pulling the drape closed around Sweetheart's room.

He goes outside, not far, a few yards from the cabin, and peers through his binoculars, but the view is obstructed by fence and trees and he couldn't see a ship from here if it was coming in. Besides, it's dark. He sighs, goes back inside, lights two oil lamps in the living room, takes down his crossbow, and busies himself with tightening strings that can't get any tighter.

[*]

The _Godspeed_ glides up the James River and away from Hampton. The stars twinkle above the river, painting pretty silver patterns on the blue-black water. Carol walks past Thomas and Laura, who are hanging over the rail of the ship to watch the water ripple as they sail north.

She strolls toward Lieutenant Alvarado at the helm to see if she can help in any way. On the way, she passes Devon, Kaitlyn, and Joe, who are playing cards atop a barrel by oil lamp and smiling and laughing despite all they've been through, despite the parts the men are lacking and the wife and mother who has been lost. She feels a surge of hope for the future that deadens the hollow ache left by the bloody deeds she recently had to do.

Carol's ready to be home.

 **[*]**

Daryl's moved on to cleaning a gun that doesn't really need to be cleaned. It's late, and as much as he wants to wander down to the docks and keep a lookout for Carol's ship, he knows he can't leave Sweetheart sleeping alone here. Dog's not an adequate babysitter.

When the door creaks open a few minutes later, his heart thuds with mingled relief and joy. He leaves the cleaning rod stuck halfway down the barrel of the rifle and leaps to his feet. Carol drops her pack on the floor and shuts the door behind her.

Daryl rushes at her like a football player and lifts her up into a great big bear hug before setting her down again.

She laughs. "Did you miss me?"

He shrugs. "Little bit. Maybe."

Carol laces her arms around his neck and kisses him tenderly. When she pulls back, he says, "Good to have ya home, Beautiful."

She smiles. "It's good to be home."

"Yer later 'n I 'spected."

"Were you starting to worry?" she asks.

"Little bit. Maybe."

Her hands slide off his shoulders. "Well, we had a little bit of an adventure. Maybe."

"What adventure?" he asks.

"I'm going to peek in on Sweetheart."

"What adventure?" Daryl repeats, the muscles in his body tightening. "Anyone dead?"

"None of ours."

Those words unwind the tension in his body, but when Carol returns from checking on Sweetheart, he asks again, " _What_ adventure?"

"I think we're going to need a drink for this story. A strong drink."

"Tavern's closed. 'Sides, can't leave Sweetheart."

"We don't have to." She unzips her pack and pulls out a full bottle of vodka.

Daryl's eyes widen. "If that's yer finder's fee – a whole damn bottle of old world hooch – then ya must of found some good shit."

"Good and bad," she says as she wanders over to the hutch to pull down two whiskey glasses. Carol pours them each about two ounces, and they settle on the couch together.

Daryl leans back against an arm of the couch facing her and swirls the clear liquid in his glass. "So?"

She tells him what happened. By the time she's done, he's drained the vodka. "Stupid," he growls. "Goin' back for 'em like that. Could of got yerself killed!"

"I _didn't_ get myself killed. And don't tell me you wouldn't have gone back for Thomas if you had been there."

He seizes the vodka bottle grumpily and pours himself another ounce. "Should of gone back with Sarah and Santiago, come back with an army, not gone all Rambo on yer own!"

Carol extends her glass and, glowering, he pours another ounce in hers, too. "If I'd done that," she tells him as he sets the bottle down on the wicker coffee table, "he'd be a eunuch right now. Laura would be dead for failing to follow through with her initiation, and Zami would have had another postulant do it."

"Thomas can live without his balls better'n I can live without m'wife."

"I'm _fine_. I'm not even wounded. And don't tell me _you_ would have left him there to get castrated and gone back with Sarah and Santiago," Carol says. "You would have done the same thing I did."

"I _couldn't_ of done the same thing you did," Daryl grumbles. "Couldn't of just walked up there and pretended to be a man-hater."

"Oh, yeah, because you've got balls."

"Not as big as yers, though."

She laughs.

"That was crazy reckless, Carol."

"You knew what you were getting yourself into when you married me, Pookie."

Daryl chuffs. "Yeah. Should of known anyhow." He rolls a little vodka on his tongue and swallows. "Ya ain't goin' back there when they go to check the evaporation pools, are ya?"

"Probably. There were a lot of places we didn't have time to check for loot. I don't think that cult looted _all_ of Newport News."

"Them 'm comin' with ya next time. We can leave Sweetheart with the Barrons."

"Daryl," Carol says thinly.

"Ya cain't tell me a story like that 'n then 'spect me to stay home next time ya go."

"I suppose not," she agrees. "But the threat is gone. I doubt those thirteen men we left behind are going to be much trouble, with two guns and no balls between them."

Daryl winces. "Tell me 'bout the loot ya got." He needs a distraction from the image of those crazy ball-cutting women.

"Well, let's just say Linda's going to have her bar partially restocked. And I got you a nice pair of boots."

"Already got decent boots."

"The heels are coming unglued."

"Take 'em to the cobbler," he insists.

"Thank you, honey. Thank you for thinking of me and picking up a good, sturdy pair of boots. I'll break them in eventually."

"Thanks," he murmurs. He'll wear them for her when he takes her to the tavern, or on her day off when he's just doing stuff around the house. But he's getting the old ones fixed up and wearing them hunting.

"Was Sweetheart any trouble?" she asks.

"Nah. Not too much. But…thanks."

"For what?"

"All the shit ya do 'round here. 'S a lot. More 'n I realized."

She smiles. "Maybe I should go away more often. Teach you not to take me for granted."

"Ain't necessary."

"I noticed when you were gone, too, how much you do around the cabin," she admits. "Like locking up every night. Chopping the wood. Starting the fire. Pumping the fans…all the extra things I had to do when you were at Hilltop. We make a good team."

He ducks his head and smiles. "Yeah. We do, don't we?"

"May I ask, though, why is there a _snake_ in a plastic bin on my daughter's footlocker?"

"Ain't no snake! Didn't ya see its legs!"

"It was hard to see in there. Just the stars to light her room."

"'S a little brown skink. 'S a lizard."

"So it's a _pet_ now?" Carol asks.

"Yeah. Name's Stinky."

Carol laughs. "That's creative coming from you. I would have thought you'd just call it Skink."

"Well, ain't me who named it."

"She did? She actually came up with the name?"

"Think she was trying to say skink. But, yeah. 'S name's Stinky now."

"So she said a new word?" Carol asks with excitement. "Did you write it in the book?"

"Uh…no. Thought you'd want to." He doesn't tell her he couldn't find the book, even though she'd told him where it was, and he also doesn't want to tell her that was far from the only new word Sweetheart said these past three days. "That vodka makin' ya frisky?"

"Not really."

"Them vodka appletinis do," he suggests.

"Well, Linda must make those special."

Daryl frowns.

Carol smiles teasingly. "But you know what _is_ making me feel frisky? The fact that I'm back home with the man I love."

Daryl's lips twitch and the frown morphs into a slightly lecherous smile. He sets his shot glass down on the wicker coffee table, stands, and holds out his hand to her.

[*]

Daryl's fingertips flutter over Carol's naked skin. Her husband knows her body – knows the groove of every stretch mark, the rough surface of every scar, the fading outline of every old cigarette burn, the curve of every limb, the twist of every sinew – like a roadmap to every spot of pleasure. He's followed the winding path to one such spot now, and Carol bites her bottom lip to keep from moaning. He teases until she says the word she knows he's waiting for, the word that always seems to make him hungrier - " _Please_."

"Thatta girl," Daryl growls as he slides up her body. He pushes into her as his lips claims hers, and it's a delicious, delirious entry, like coming home.

They try to stay quiet, burying their sighs and groans and moans against the bed and one another so as not to wake Sweetheart. It isn't easy. He waits for her to come first. She's not sure how he holds out, because he tumbles a split second after she does, as if his restraint were dangling by the thinnest of threads.

Both are shuddering when Daryl's arms collapse and his heavy body presses fully down on hers. She pushes gently against his shoulder, and he shifts his weight off her, rolls to his side, and draws her back against himself. They lie like that for several minutes, their breaths uneven echoes of one another.

Eventually, Daryl nuzzles her neck with his nose, nips at her earlobe, and whispers, "Good?"

He has to know it was by the way she dug her nails into his back at the end, by the way she's still shivering ever so slightly. But she knows he likes to hear her say it. "Yes," she agrees.

"Mhmhm," he murmurs contentedly.

"I think I like collaborating in the patriarchal system."

" _What?_ "

Carol laughs. She covers her mouth with her own hand to quiet the sound. When her hand falls away, she tells him about the quotes on the bulletin board in the dining hall in the clubhouse, including: _When a woman reaches orgasm with a man, she is only collaborating with the patriarchal system, eroticizing her own oppression._

 _"Damn," Daryl mutters. "Glad ya ain't a feminist."_

 _"I am."_

 _"Pfffft."_

 _Carol_ _turns and_ _sits up slightly to look down at him. "What do you think a feminist is?"_

 _"Uh…" Daryl opens his mouth, and then closes it again, in that adorable way he does when he's afraid of saying the wrong thing. "Never mind."_

 _This is too good an opportunity not to tease. She tries to make her face look stern. "No. What do you think a feminist is?"_

 _"Think I missed ya," he says. " 'N 'm glad yer home. 'N I don't want to fight 'bout this dumb ass shit, whatever it is."_

 _Carol chuckles and lies back down. She rolls toward him and slings one, slender, naked leg over his own muscular one and then slides her body flush against his. "Those crazy, evil women weren't feminists. They were just cultists. A feminist is just someone who wants equal rights for women. A woman who knows how to stand up for herself and be her own woman. I'm not the woman who married Ed anymore."_

 _"Ain't neither of us who we were."_

 _"No," she says quietly. "And we're something else together than we were apart."_

 _"Like this," he murmurs. "Being someone else with ya."_

 _"I like it, too."_

 _"Mhmm…" He murmurs against her shoulder._

It's not long before they drift off. They awaken to Sweetheart struggling to crawl her way up into bed, crying, "Mama! Mama! Mama!"

"Hold on," Daryl mutters. Sunlight floods the cabin now. Carol hangs half over her side of the bed to grab some clothes and shoves Daryl his boxers. Under the covers, she shimmies into a t-shirt and a pair of underwear. When they're semi-dressed, Daryl hauls Sweetheart up into the bed. She burrows under the sheet between them and cuddles up to Carol, saying, "Mama, Sweetie's mama, yeah!"

Carol wraps her up in her arms and gives her a squeeze.

"She missed ya," Daryl says.

"I missed this," Carol replies, and turns to rest an arm across her daughter until her hand alights on her husband's hip. She loves this morning, warm beneath the thin sheet, with her little family, an imperfect family, but a perfect-for- _her_ family.

Dog leaps up onto the bed and licks Carol's face. "Eww!" she cries and pushes him away as Sweetheart laughs. Carol laughs, too, when Dog barks and tries to shove himself between her and Daryl, half on top of Sweetheart, forcing himself into the giant pile of cuddles.


	186. Chapter 186

Carol drifts back to sleep in the pile of cuddles. It's been a long three days. She awakens for a moment to the sound of Sweetheart saying, "Uh oh, Dada, uh oh. Boo boo." She peers with one eye at her daughter, who has just put her fingertip on one of the lashes on Daryl's chest, where his father once whipped him with a switch. "Boo boo!"

"'S fine," Daryl tells her. "Long time ago. Don't hurt no more."

Carol thinks that's not quite true. Those old wounds still haunt his insecurities, but not as often as they used to.

"Bye bye boo boo!" Sweetheart says and leans forward and kisses his scar with a loud smack, the way Carol sometimes does to Sweetheart when she skins her knee or bumps into something. "Bye by boo boo!" Sweetheart says again and kisses the next one and then the next.

Daryl smiles. "All better," he murmurs. He catches Carol's now open eyes, and she smiles gently at him, but then her eyes droop down again. "C'mon," she hears him say just before she drifts off. "'S let mama sleep 'n make us some oatmeal for breakfast."

"Yum!"

[*]

Carol doesn't get to sleep in as late as she'd like. Daryl rouses her to tell her Garland has sent for her. "Guess yer s'posed to be at a Council Meetin'?"

"Shit," she mutters. "What time is it?"

"Time for the meetin'. Drop Sweetheart at the day care on yer way. 'M leavin' out the back gate to hunt today. Layin' new traps."

Carol wishes she could have the whole day off but there are the refugees to deal with and the inventory to update with new loot. She's the last one to sit down at the council table, where the idle chit chat dies and Garland, as usual, gets right down to business.

"Sheriff Earl has cleared the refugees for probationary admission." The mayor flips open a file folder. "They've been given knives but not guns for now. Last night we had them all in the quarantine room, but we need to make permanent room assignments. It seems Devon and Kaitlyn are a couple, so they can share a room."

"I'd suggest the old library," Carol says. She masks a yawn. "It's already been cleared out. It's a decent size, if you don't have kids."

"And they won't, from what I hear," Barry says. All the men wince a little.

"Jeremy and Oliva took the furniture to Earl's cabin, though," Carolyn observes. "We'll need to requisition a mattress from storage. They can build a bedframe. We've got an extra dresser, too."

"All in favor?" Garland asks, and all hands go up.

"We can put Laura in Edgar's old room," Inola suggests, "now that Gunther's cleared that out for us."

"Did you have to put it that way?" asks Gunther, scratching his cheek. Carol notices his usual thick stubble is absent. Until Dianne goes back to Oceanside next week, he'll probably stay clean shaven.

"It's already furnished," Inola continues. "And Joe can stay in the quarantine room, I guess?"

"We should leave that free in case we actually need it for quarantine," Dr. Ahmad says. "That was the point of clearing it in the first place."

"I can divide the old bunker into two apartments," Thomas tells them. "Put a wood wall down the middle. There's an entrance on both ends, and fireplaces on both ends. And it used to have sixteen people in there, so it'll make two apartments easily. I don't need all that space to myself."

"Good, Joe can stay there," Garland says.

"I was, uh…I was thinking Laura should stay there," Thomas says.

Barry snorts. "I bet you were."

Thomas flushes. "It's just, that dormitory is mostly full of men. There are only a few women in there, and none in the suite Edgar's in. She'll probably be more comfortable in the fort."

"Why?" Commander Witherspoon asks. "Wasn't she subjugated by women, not men? And wasn't she surviving with just her brother before that? She's probably _more_ comfortable with men. And won't she want to be down here, near her people?"

"They're not really her _people_ ," Thomas says. "It wasn't like that there. They were kept apart. And Joe is Kaitlyn's father. He should be near her."

Carolyn's brow furrows. "This is the woman who was about to cut off your testicles, wasn't she?"

"The point is, she didn't," Thomas says.

Barry smirks. "So now you want to show her why they were worth saving?"

Thomas glares. "I'm just saying there's room in the bunker!"

"And you aren't at all interested in her?" Commander Witherspoon asks with a slight smile. Dr. Ahmad chuckles.

"I don't know!" Thomas says. "It's not like I'm coming onto her tomorrow! But y'all don't have to be so snide. You don't know what it's like! You _all_ have someone. All of you!"

Carolyn leans forward across the table and waves a hand in his face as though to say, _Am I invisible?_

"Well, _almost_ all of you," Thomas clarifies. "And none of you know how lucky you are to have that!"

"Oh, I have an inkling," Garland says.

Carol thinks of her morning puddle of cuddles on the bed and smiles to herself.

"Things not working out with the Lesbian of Hilltop?" Barry asks Carolyn.

Carolyn glares at him. "Tara's not my _type_."

Barry snorts. "I heard you're not _hers_. But if you get lonely, there's always Candy. I hear she swings both ways. For the right price."

Gunther glares at him. "She's not turning tricks anymore."

"Yeah, sure," Barry says.

"It was a terrible thing, what happened to her," Gunther murmurs, "but I think she turned a new leaf because of it. Good from evil."

"Well, she's going to be jealous of Laura," Commander Witherspoon muses.

"What?" Thomas asks.

"You haven't noticed Candy's grown sweet on you?" Witherspoon asks.

"Candy's just like that with every man," Thomas says.

"When she's working a man, she's like that," Gunther says. "But she's not working anymore."

Thomas blinks like he's not quite sure how to process this new bit of information.

"Can we get back on track?" a peeved Garland asks, his voice a little louder than it needs to be. Faces turns to him. "Who do we put in the dorms, and who do we put in the barracks?"

"What are their jobs going to be?" Carol asks. "That could help us make the decision of housing location."

Garland slides out a sheet of paper containing Earl's interview notes. "The men can both fish and garden."

Gunther and Witherspoon look at each other. "Garden," Gunther says. "Fish," Witherspoon says.

"But the notes say Joe gets a little seasick sometimes," Garland continues. "So let's put him on gardens, and Devon on the fishing crew."

Witherspoon nods. "Fair enough," Gunther says.

"Laura grew up on a farm in the old world," Garland continues, "so I say we give her to Gunther for twenty hours to do as he likes."

Barry snorts. "Thomas would rather you give her to him to do as he likes."

Garland rolls his eyes coolly toward Barry, who chuckles.

"I need someone else on the milking," Gunther says. "And the barns are in or near the fort, so it makes sense for her to room at the barracks."

"So it's decided?" Garland asks. "Thomas divides the barracks, we put Laura in half, and Joe goes in Edgar's old room? Tally?" All hands go up. He pulls out another sheet of paper. "This morning, the court reporter inventoried everything looted on the trip. Good work, Carol. Thomas. Now, the vegetables and fruits will only last so long, so I suggest bumping up rations by 10% for just this week. I did the math. It works."

"Christmas in June," Inola says. "I'm for it." She raises one hand, with her other resting on her protruding, pregnant stomach. Everyone else approves.

"The booze goes to the tavern for distribution as usual," Garland continues. "Carol and Thomas each took a bottle for their finder's fees. The soldiers who volunteered to rescue Thomas are asking for a finder's fee, too. I suggest they be allowed two free shots at the tavern."

"Just for being in the right place at the right time?" Barry asks. "When the rest of us have to pay good ammunition or tobacco or coffee beans?"

"If we want people to sign up for dangerous missions in the future, it should probably provide perks," Carol says. "I'm with Garland on this one. Two free drinks per man seems reasonable. Sarah should get in on that too, even though she wasn't at the apartments. She went back to help raise the army."

Barry shakes his head. "I'm volunteering for the next mission."

"If you can get permission from your wife," Gunther says.

"I wouldn't be talking about being whipped if I were you," Barry tells him. "I see you're shaving regularly these days. And you change your shirt more than twice a week now."

"I _always_ changed my shirt every day," Gunther drawls. "I just have several shirts that look a lot alike. Dianne brought me a few more that are different colors. That's all."

Barry sniffs. "Are you actually wearing cologne these days?"

"Of course not. Dianne brought a couple bars of Oceanside's soap. It's different than ours. It has a different scent. Sea breeze or something."

Commander Witherspoon laughs.

"Well it does," Gunther insists. "Here, smell me." He holds his bare, lower arm beneath Witherspoon's nose.

The commander rears back. But then he admits, "It's actually kind of nice."

"Are you going to get some for _Mitch_?" Barry asks snidely.

"No. I like the natural forest smell when he gets back from a hunt. The smell of leaves and trees and" he wiggles an eyebrow at Barry, "man sweat."

Barry grimaces. "Enough details."

Carol smiles. "It is the best natural cologne," she agrees.

"Kind of turn on, really," Witherspoon says.

Garland's face is a glower. "Can we get back to business? We've received an official petition to amend the charter, and we have to vote on the amendment." He drops a piece of paper in the center of the table.

Forty citizen signatures are required to submit an amendment for consideration by the council, but this petition has _sixty-five_. Carol recognizes a lot of the names: Mitch, Dante, Dwight, Sherry, Trisha, Candy, Dr. Emily...There are a lot of influential names on there, people well known in the community: the tavern manager, Linda; the judge, Annette; the court's attorneys; Gunther's boss and Linda's boyfriend, the head farm manager, Ernesto; Sheriff Earl Carter and two of his deputies - Santiago and Andrew; Captain McBride, a junior lieutenant, and an ensign. There's also one of the heroes of the mutiny of 7 NE – Daryl Dixon himself. Carol wonders why he didn't mention the petition to her.

Garland clears his throat. "The proposal is to extend the term limits for the mayor's position by two years, for four years total, and to extend the council term limits by one year, to eight years total. They're also proposing that the mayor, once elected, _appoint_ to him or herself a deputy mayor from among the elected council members. The deputy mayor would be responsible for duties assigned by the mayor, and would also step in if the mayor became temporarily incapacitated or, in the event the mayor dies, until a special elections could be cobbled together."

"And how do you feel about this?" Dr. Ahmad asks a little defensively, perhaps because he was planning to throw his name in for mayor after the council election in a few weeks. "Did _you_ start this petition?"

"Of course I didn't," Garland insists.

"Did Shannon?" Dr. Ahmad pulls the petition toward himself and scours the signatures.

"Shannon would like me to retire," Garland says. "I'm sure she didn't even sign it."

Dr. Ahmad scours the signatures but must not see hers among them.

"Will you run again if this passes?" Carolyn asks pointedly. She, too, was planning to run for mayor if elected in July.

"I don't know. I'd have to discuss that with my wife. Part of me was looking forward to retiring from this position, but part of me is nervous about passing the baton. I'm not sure any of you realize just how much work I actually do in this role."

"You don't think any of us are ready?" Dr. Ahmad asks.

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to," Carolyn mutters.

"It doesn't matter what I think," Garland says. "The people have the power to elect the mayor from among the elected council members. _If_ this amendment were to pass, and _if_ I were to run again, it would still be up to them whether or not to elect me for a third term."

"So will you run again or not if this passes?" Carolyn repeats.

"I don't _know_. As I said, I'd have to discuss that with my wife. I'm not doing anything without her support. But I won't swear I _won't_ run."

Carolyn looks down at the petition. "Inola, your husband signed this. And Barry, your wife. And Carol - your husband. Did you know about this?"

"I didn't," Carol admits. "But I assume these signatures were collected when I was out of town."

"Sure I knew," Barry says. "And I would have signed it myself if I weren't a council member." Council members can't sign citizen petitions, as they have to approve or deny them. "You ever hear that saying, don't switch horses in midstream?"

"We're still a relatively new government," Inola says. "This whole revamp of Jamestown is in its infancy. It's toddlerhood, anyway. The people are _worried_. They're worried because things have been going so well for Jamestown in a world where things _rarely_ go well for other camps. They don't want to rock the boat. Maybe some people just need a little more transition time."

"People get nervous with too much change, too quickly," Commander Witherspoon agrees. "I've noticed it among the crew, with all the shifting of leadership that's happened lately in the navy. It hasn't been easy."

"What do you think, Carol?" Garland asks.

She thinks it's interesting Daryl signed the petition, and she wonders what was going through his head when he did. Was he thinking this would ensure Garland's election for the next two years, and therefore ensure Carol _wouldn't_ become mayor? She knows he doesn't like the idea of her working so much while Sweetheart is still a toddler. She already agreed not to run this July, but she was seriously thinking of throwing her hat in the ring _next_ July. If this amendment passes, Garland may well remain mayor for the next two years, and she'd have to wait another year to make her bid. Perhaps Daryl would prefer that. Sweetheart would be three and half then, and of an age to begin attending the preschool.

The idea of waiting another year doesn't upset her – but the idea of being pre-empted by her own husband, without so much as a discussion, does. Of course, she wasn't _home_ to have a discussion. She was on the mission to the salt ponds. She can't really blame him for not talking it over, and maybe that wasn't even his motive. Maybe he just thinks the amendment is a good idea, from a political perspective. Not that Daryl has many firmly held political opinions.

"I think…" They wait while she gathers her thoughts. The truth is, the petition is not a bad idea, even though it might delay her ambitions. "Two years is a short time. The first constitution of Virginia, in the late 1700s, had a one-year term for the governor, like we do for mayor. It was renewable _three_ times." She's read the original history displays in the museum. "And later it became one, four-year term. So a one-year term renewable four times might be a good idea. And I think when the people feel this strongly about something, strongly enough to collect _sixty-five_ signatures, and some of them from very prominent citizens, we should take it seriously."

Garland nods. "I like the idea of a deputy mayor to share the burden."

"Another advantage of having a deputy mayor," Carol muses, "is that it can allow future mayors to train council members to step up into that role one day."

"But then is the mayor essentially just _anointing_ his replacement?" Carolyn asks. "Since he would be appointing the deputy mayor?"

"Not really," Thomas says. "The people still have to _elect_ the mayor. They won't necessarily elect the deputy mayor as the next mayor. It's not like the lieutenant governor or the vice president always got elected."

"And a mayor who keeps getting re-elected for four years," Carol says, "could appoint a _different_ deputy mayor each year. He or she could potentially have trained four different council members by the time he or she even hits his term limits."

"And the disadvantages of the proposal?" Garland asks.

"It's awfully close to the election," Dr. Ahmad says. "If _you_ run for mayor again, it could appear as if you were maneuvering to prolong your power."

"What power?" Gunther asks. "It seems like a whole lot of responsibility if you ask me."

Commander Witherspoon agrees: "Garland doesn't have a quarter of the power the captain does on the _Susan Constant_. Or that even I do when I'm in charge of the _Godspeed_."

"I'm just saying, an amendment like this…" Dr. Ahmad sighs. "Perhaps it should be adopted when the current mayor isn't at the _end_ of his term limits and about to have to step down in three and half weeks."

"Can we just vote on it?" Inola asks.

Garland taps the petition. "All in favor?"

Barry, Gunther, Commander Witherspoon, Inola, and Thomas raise their hands right away. Carol hesitates only a moment, and then follows them. Garland, looking reluctant, raises his as well. Only Dr. Ahmad and Carolyn remain with their hands on the table. They look at one another. Carolyn shrugs and raises her hand.

"It has to be unanimous for an amendment," Gunther tells Dr. Ahmad. "Do you really want your personal ambition to be the road block here?"

"What _ambition_?" Dr. Ahmad asks. "More like a desire to serve my community. Like you said, it's a whole lot of responsibility. But...Fine." He raises his hand.

"The amendment has passed," Garland announces and hands it to Thomas, the Council's secretary. "See that it's filed with the charter."


	187. Chapter 187

The butcher's cleaver comes down hard on the table to chop off one of the wild boar's hoofs. "Thanks, Norma," Daryl says as the butcher's wife pours steaming hot water from a kettle into the washing trough near the table. He and Mitch went out to lay traps in the back forest, but they ended up spying and snagging a boar while they were there.

"You're very polite," Norma says as she stirs in the water with a paddle. "Your mama raised you well."

"Pfft. Nah. She didn't. But 'm learnin'." Daryl plunges his hands into the now warm water and scrubs. Mitch begins washing up beside him.

Norma shoots Daryl a sympathetic look. "Well that's a shame. Every boy deserves a good mother. I like to think mine had one. For as long as he was alive anyway."

Daryl glances up from the washing trough. He feels like he should say something sympathetic, but he doesn't know what. "Sorry. 'S world's a bitch." That wasn't right, but it was all he could think of.

"He died in the old world, actually. Car accident when he was seventeen." Beside her, her husband brings the next blow of the cleaver down hard. "He had his seatbelt on and everything. You can't make any world safe. Not completely."

Daryl shakes the water from his hands and thinks of Sweetheart, of this world he's been trying to help build for her – with a roof over her head and a fire in her hearth and walls all around her. It could all be in vain. She could die at seventeen in some pointless horse and cart accident that has nothing to do with walkers or bandits. He doesn't worry about walkers, so why is he suddenly worried about _that_? Again, he wonders if this is just part of being a father. Do you just worry about your kids all the damn time? He didn't worry about Judith or Hershel like this, but they weren't his responsibility, either of them, not ultimately. One belongs to Michonne, and the other to the Hilltop as a whole.

Norma hands him a towel, and he dries his hands.

Gunther, who is walking from the direction of one of the barns, pauses and pets Dog. Dog bends his head down as Gunther scratches him behind the ears. "Mind if I borrow the ol' boy for an hour or two to herd some sheep?"

"'S all yours," Daryl says. "He ain't worked too hard this mornin'." He just trotted alongside the hunters, didn't even have to retrieve anything today. Daryl whistles, rolls his wrist, and points a finger to tell Dog to follow Gunther, and the animal does, happily padding alongside his best friend's friend.

Daryl hands Mitch the towel, and as he dries his hands, Mitch asks, "Do you have time to grab a drink at the tavern?"

"Yeah. Could use a drink." Carol's obviously done with that council meeting, if Gunther is out and about, but she probably also wants some mommy-daughter time with Sweetheart after her three days away. She doesn't need him shuffling around the cabin all afternoon, getting in their way. "You buyin'?"

"No."

[*]

They order lunch while they're there. Daryl has the ammo for it, since he never uses his rations to hunt, and he doesn't feel the need to hoard them now that Carol came home with thirty rounds as part of her finder's fee from all that crazy lady loot. That's _her_ money, he knows, that's how she likes to see it, because Ed controlled the finances, but just knowing she has it makes it easier for him to spend his. They do have one "joint savings account" of a sort, though, in a cash box in the footlocker by their bed. They each agreed to kick in three rounds a week to it. They've dipped into it twice only, for mutual purchases from the warehouse for the cabin, and they're up to almost 100 rounds now, in case the shit ever hits the fan and they have to open fire.

Daryl never had a savings account in his life, or a checking account for that matter. He got paid in cash for what odd jobs he did do, most of the time, and on the rare occasions when he got a written check, he'd cash it at one of those check cashing places that always took to damn big a chunk. He'd keep the money in his boot, at least he used to, until Merle found it. Then he started keeping it in his underwear. Carol would be horrified if she knew how often he handed over some ball-sweaty cash to some poor, unsuspecting cashier. There are some things they don't need to share.

Trisha slides two bowls of stew onto the bar before them, while Candy, crutches balanced beneath her arms, pulls their pints. "How's the ankle?" Mitch asks.

"Doc says I should be off these crutches in three weeks," Candy answers. She puts the pints on the bar in front of her, but Trisha brings them over to the men. Candy hobbles over to face them. "I hear your wife scored some serious loot, Daryl."

"Mhmhm."

"Must have had a sweet finder's fee. Guess that's why you're eating out."

"Nah. 'S all her money."

Candy glances to a table in the corner of the tavern, where Thomas is eating lunch with Laura. "I bet that's why Thomas is eating out, though. He usually just gets a beer after those council meetings. But now he's buying lunch for the new girl."

"Someone's a little green around the gills," Trisha says as she leans back against the bar next to Candy, half facing Daryl and Mitch.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Candy insists.

Mitch smirks and looks from one woman to the other. "What's going on here?"

"Candy has a little crush on Thomas," Trisha explains.

"I do not! Don't be ridiculous."

"Oh, come on, just let yourself feel it. You probably haven't had a crush since you were sixteen. You're so jaded."

Candy glances back at Thomas and Laura and then forward again. "He's been sweet to me is all. So has Gunther. You never accused me of having a crush on _Gunther_."

"Because Gunther reminds you of your daddy," Trisha says.

"I'm not _that_ young," Candy says. "Not anymore. I let my best years slip away."

"Oh shush," Trisha tells her. "I just mean Thomas is about your age, and he's…well, he's _kind_ of cute. Sort of. Maybe if he didn't have all those freckles."

"The freckles are adorable," Candy insists.

"Aha!" Trisha exclaims.

"Stop it!" Candy grumbles. "It doesn't matter, anyhow. He never went to the whorehut, you know. Even if I _did_ have a crush on him – which I do _not_ – he's probably not interested in _that_ type."

"And what type is that?" Trisha asks defensively. "I worked at the whorehut, too, and Andrew was still happy to marry me!"

"Andrew _visited_ the whorehut," Candy reminds her. "It would be a bit hypocritical for him to judge."

"Not that often he didn't!" Trisha insists. "And he mostly saw me."

"Mhmh," Candy says. "Mostly."

"Well I'm the one he wanted to marry when the whorehut closed down!"

Mitch glances at Daryl as though to say – _I think we made a mistake sitting at the bar._ Daryl agrees, but it's a bit late to retreat now.

"Anyway, I don't think Thomas judges," Trisha says. " _You_ don't judge us do you, Mitch?"

"No, ma'am," replies Mitch, a little wide eyed. He quickly shovels a spoonful of stew into his mouth, and Daryl follows suit. Maybe if his mouth is full, she won't ask him the same question.

"See," Trisha says. "Mitch doesn't judge and Mitch never went to the whorehut."

"Because Mitch isn't interested in pussy," Candy replies.

The fisherman at the other end of the bar whistles. "Hey, gorgeous, bring me a pint, would you?" Trisha rolls her eyes but pulls a pint of beer and heads over to serve it to him.

"Well if it isn't the mayor!" Candy exclaims as Garland walks through the saloon doors. "I haven't seen you in here in ages. To what do we owe the honor?"

Garland walks across the creaky wooden floorboards and settles on a stool catty corner to where Daryl is sitting at the L of the bar. They nod a greeting to one another. "I could just use a drink," Garland replies. "Some of that Newport News whiskey if you would. Neat."

"That's four rounds a shot, you know. Not three like the Jamestown shine."

"I know." Garland lays five rounds on the bar.

"Is Shannon going to approve this expenditure?" Candy teases as she sweeps the ammunition into her hand, drops four rounds into the dark green, metal cash box, and pockets the fifth. "She told me you two were saving up to buy materials from the warehouse to build a screened-in playroom out back for the boys."

"Shannon's already about to be pissed off at me. I figured I might as well piggyback this offense."

"Oh no, mayor," Candy says as she pours his whiskey. "Have you been naughty? Never could get you to be with me. And Lord knows I tried."

When she slides Garland the glass, he lifts it and says, "No, not like that." He sips and then turns to Daryl. "Is Carol mad at you?"

"For what?" Daryl asks.

"Signing that petition that could mean I might run for mayor again this year and next." Garland sets his glass down. "You haven't said so, and neither has Carol, but I'm pretty sure she was thinking of running when she thought I _wouldn't_ be the competition."

"Oh boy," Mitch murmurs.

"Nah," Daryl insists. "Carol wasn't gonna run this year."

"No?" Garland asks.

"Nah." She _was_ thinking of running _next_ July, though he doesn't say that. She told him not to tell, after all. And what's one more year, if Garland does serve twice more? That's not long to wait. Sweetheart's so young. It'll be better if the girl is three and half if Carol's going to be working that much. Sweetheart will be in preschool then. She won't be having any more potty accidents. There will be fewer sheets to wash. She won't be climbing bookcases and putting every object in sight in her mouth. He hopes not anyway. "'N sides, Carol voted for it, huh? If it passed?"

"Yes. The vote has to be unanimous," Garland agrees.

"So she must think 's a good idea."

"I take it you haven't talked to her about it yet, have you?" Garland asks.

"She was in Hampton when Earl came 'round with the petition," Daryl says. "And I ain't been home since this mornin'."

Trisha has now gone to wait on Laura and Thomas and has paused to chat with them, while Candy has hobbled to the other end of the bar, gone out the swinging door, and sat down next to the fishermen, who is letting her take sips from his pint of beer, even though he must know she's no longer offering anything in exchange for booze.

Garland takes another slow sip of his whiskey and sets it down again. "Well, you can't sleep on my couch tonight if Carol kicks you out of bed. Because I'll most likely be on it."

Daryl pushes his soup bowl aside and reaches for his beer. "Hell is she gonna be mad at ya for?"

"Because I voted for the amendment. Well, not because I _voted_ for it so much as because I'm going to tell her I _do_ want to run again." Garland sighs. "She thought this was all going to be over in July. She thought I wasn't going to be _able_ to run for mayor, that I'd just be a councilman. So we never had to _discuss_ it, really. She's kind of made the assumption that I _want_ to retire from the mayorship. And I suppose I let her assume it, since I thought I was going to have to."

"Ah," Daryl says.

"It does put a bit of a strain on a marriage, this position. All the hours."

"Mhm." Daryl's aware. It's why he doesn't want Carol to do it right away, with a toddler in the house.

"But at the same time…" Garland says, "even considering all the drudgery of the role, I feel like I serve it well. I used to think I was born to be a detective, but I think maybe I just like to _think_. And there's a lot of thinking to be done when it comes to running a town. Planning. Theorizing. Speculating. Crafting. There's a lot of bullshit paperwork, too, but…" He shrugs. "And I'm starting to get the impression that maybe the people _want_ me to be mayor a little longer."

"Sheriff Earl said it only took half a day to get all those signatures," Mitch tells him. "So you're going to run again for mayor? Even if Shannon doesn't want you to?"

"No, I won't run if she won't support me. But the things is…she will. Here's what's probably going to happen. Shannon's going to be angry with me for 24 hours. Maybe 48. And then she's gradually going to come around to the idea. And then she's going to kiss babies and charm sailors while she campaigns for me. Because that's the kind of wonderful wife she is. She's going to do what you're going to do, Daryl," the mayor points in his direction, "whenever it is that Carol decides to run for mayor."

"I ain't kissin' no babies. 'Cept m' own. Well, 'n maybe VanDaryl."

"He does have very kissable cheeks," Garland says.

"Like yours, mayor?" a returning Trisha asks with a wink as she deposits some ammo in the cashier's box.

"Candy already collected the tip," Garland tells her wryly.

[*]

When Daryl comes home to the cabin, he's a bit nervous, after everything Garland said, but Carol doesn't look angry. She looks happy. She's building a tower with Sweetheart on the living room floor. He slumps into the armchair and smiles at his little family.

"She said ten new words today!" Carol exclaims. "Ten! I wrote them all in the book." He sees that book is on the coffee table now. He wonders where she was keeping it. "That's so many in one day. She didn't say any new ones when I was gone?"

"Stinky," Daryl says. "Told ya." He doesn't want to admit there were more words and that he couldn't find the book. Besides, he feels like he should let Carol enjoy all the words like new. It makes her happy, writing down the words.

"How was the hunt?" she asks.

Daryl's tense muscles unwind with relief. She's not mad about the petition. It's just a normal late afternoon at home in the cabin. They'll relax until dinner. Eat, clean up, tuck in Sweetheart, go to bed themselves, maybe even make a little love. Everything is fine. "Good. Got a boar. Ain't as good as Gunther's pig bacon, but…"

"Well, we can only kill so many pigs a year, so it will be nice to have it."

"Yeah." Daryl smiles as Sweetheart holds a block out in his direction to show him before drawing it back and putting it on the tower with Carol's help. Everything's just fine. Garland didn't know what the hell he was talking about. Carol's not going to be mad at him.

"So…" Carol says as she takes the next block Sweetheart hands her and rests it on top of the tower. "Did you sign a petition while I was gone?"

 _Shit._


	188. Chapter 188

"Uh..." He could lie. He could say he didn't even read the petition, that he just signed it because Earl urged him to and he was in a hurry and Sweetheart was getting into something. But he's never lied to her. Well, he _has_. But usually it's been to protect her from something, like that time he told her everyone was fine in Alexandria, even though Glenn and Abraham had been brutally beaten to death, because he couldn't bear to watch her heart shatter. He's never lied to her just to cover his own ass before. "Yeah."

"Uh oh, Dada, uh oh!" At first, Daryl thinks Sweetheart has supernaturally sensed he might be in trouble, but then he sees she's pointing to the toppled tower, which fell beneath its own unbalanced weight.

Carol begins to help her rebuild it. "So you thought it was a good idea?"

"Uh..." Daryl watches Sweetheart put a block on top of two blocks. The tower wobbles for a second. "Well..." The tower stands. "I guess you did, huh? Since ya voted to approve it?"

"It was kind of hard not to, when there were sixty-five signatures, from the sheriff and the judge and the captain, no less, and from my own husband."

Her _own husband_. He's not sure about the way she said that. Was there accusation in her tone? He can't really tell. At least he can rest assured she's not going to fight with him in front of Sweetheart, not loudly anyway. Not that she often raises her voice when she's mad. Not Carol. She usually gets _quieter._

But she's not getting quieter now. She's just talking at her normal level of voice. Still, he feels like he's walking on thin ice with her, so he figures he better take each step gently, and not start jumping all of the sudden. "Ya wouldn't of signed it if ya disagreed," he says.

"Four years is a reasonable term limit," she replies. "And if Garland chooses to run and is elected again, he'll make an excellent mayor. Again. I admit I wonder, though, if you might have signed it just because you don't _want_ me to run next year."

Daryl glances at Sweetheart, who is intent on her tower. "Kid's young."

"Garland has a toddler, too. And a preschooler."

"I ain't sleepin' with Garland. And I ain't raisin' that toddler with 'em."

Carol nods. "I see."

She _sees_. Hell's that mean - she _sees_? Does that mean she agrees, or she's pissed off?

"You want to take over here?" she asks as she stands from the floor. "I'm going to get dinner started."

"Yeah," Daryl agrees, still not quite sure if she's mad. She's not _acting_ mad, but things feel a bit off. He plays with Sweetheart for a while, but when Gunther returns Dog, and Dog takes over as the toddler's playmate, Daryl makes his way over to the little kitchen. "Ya mad at me?" he asks.

"Should I be?"

"Ya just seem...off."

Carol sighs. "I just wish we were on the same page on this, is all. I guess we can't be on the same page on everything all the time. I was planning to run for mayor a year from now. You know that."

"Mhmh. Yeah. But…why can't it wait?"

"It can," she says. "And now it will." She scrapes the chopped onion into the stew and then slaps a carrot on top of the cutting board. She chops off the green. "But I won't now, not if Garland runs." _Slice. Slice. Slice._ "And I wonder if, two years from now, we're just going to repeat this same argument again, and you're _still_ not going to want me to run."

He watches the knife rhythmically slice. "Don't get why ya wanna do it so bad," he admits.

She stops chopping. "I don't know. Maybe I'm arrogant. Maybe I miss being queen."

"Ya ain't arrogant."

Carol slides the carrot slices into the stew. "I think I'd be good at it, though."

"'Course ya would."

She sets the cutting board down. "Jamestown is my home now. I feel more at home here than I ever did in the Kingdom or Alexandria or the prison. I want to help keep it safe and prosperous and running smoothly. I want to serve this community."

"Sounds real arrogant."

Carol smiles.

Daryl smiles back. "Ain't gonna be an argument in two years," he promises. "'N two years, I'll kiss babies for ya."

She laughs. "As long as you don't kiss the dairy girls."

"Pffft."

"Are they still flirting with you?"

"Not since ya scared 'em away."

Sweetheart toddles over, saying "Hawt! Hawt!"

"Yes, hot," Carol agrees. "Don't touch."

[*]

Carol wants to put the little girl to bed tonight. When she emerges from behind the drape, Dog perks up from his throne on the rug, trots over, and slips under the drape to take up his guard position by Sweetheart. Daryl lays aside his crossbow and stretches out his arm on the back of the couch as Carol eases down next to him and slouches against his side. He kisses the top of her head. "She out?"

"Like a light," Carol answers.

Daryl sniffs her hair. "Why ya smell like peaches?"

"I took my weekly shower, you know."

"With peaches?"

She chuckles. "There was some kind of shampoo in the women's locker room. It smells."

"Smells good."

"Are you trying to get in my pants?" she teases.

"Always."

Carol swings her legs up on the couch. "Well, right now I just want to cuddle for a while."

Daryl settles his head back on the couch and puts his feet up on the coffee table. "Sounds good."

It never goes any farther than that. They both drift off to sleep there. Carol wakes first, an hour later, and nudges him to urge him to the bed.

[*]

Over the next week, the refugees begin to settle into life at Jamestown. There are a lot of whispers about the men being castrated. When Carol's patrolling past the barn that houses the cows during milking, she hears one of the dairy girls ask Kaitlyn, who is now working with them, "So, like, Devon can _still_ get erections?"

"They actually last longer than usual. The problem is, he doesn't have much of a libido. He hardly ever _wants_ sex."

"That's a shame," the dairy girl tells her. "He's really cute."

The last thing Carol hears is Kaitlyn saying, "Not quite as cute as Nick" as she moves past the open door. Nick is a front gate guard, in his late twenties, and, like Raul, he once dated Kelly, before she settled on Harry. Carol foresees a bit of drama unraveling, and she hopes she doesn't have to break up a fight between Devon and Nick, especially not while Devon is still on probationary admission to the community.

She continues her rounds and stops by to say hello to Shannon in the green house. She's getting in some hours while Gary is in preschool and VanDaryl is in the nursery. As she makes some cuttings, she tells Carol that Garland is planning to run for mayor again.

"I figured he would," Carol says.

"We had a bit of a row about it," Shannon tells her. "I thought he was planning to retire." She sighs. "I know this is best for Jamestown, I just want my husband around the house more! Is that too much to ask?"

"No," Carol says. "Daryl feels the same way. He's glad I'm not running next year."

"You can still _run_ ," Shannon says. "Get your name out there on the ballot, so they know you're interested."

"Maybe I will. Not this July, but next."

"Are you and Garland still fighting?" Carol asks.

"No. We're fine. We had fantastic make up sex."

Carol chuckles. "Good."

When Carol makes her way down to the docks later, the speed boat has pulled alongside and Captain McBride is offering his hand to Cyndie to help her onto the dock. Raul and Enid disembark next, looking very comfortable together, and after exchanging greetings with Carol, they go off to get Enid settled in his room. She'll be staying until the speed boat's next mail trip in mid-July, and then she'll return to the Hilltop via Oceanside.

Rosita has joined the mail crew again – probably to see Sheriff Earl – and she gives Carol a hug. Carol's disappointed to see that Henry hasn't joined them. "He sent a letter, though," Cyndie assures her.

Though Henry is absent from the speed boat, there is another unexpected passenger aboard: Eugene.

Carol hugs him after he makes his unsteady way up onto the dock. "It's good to see you!" she says as she draws back. "What brings you to Jamestown?"

"I thought it imperative that I consult with your electrician and engineer and peruse your warehouse for useful materials as I will be spearheading this project to develop functional lithium batteries for use heretofore."

"Ah. We started mining the salt ponds in Hampton like you wanted."

"Hunky dory," Eugene replies. "Also, rumor has it that Jamestown is possessed of a well-stocked tavern. I would be remiss if I did not pay a visit in the course of my duration here."

"I'll direct you to it," Carol promises him. "And you're welcome to stay on our couch." She glances at Rosita. "I assume you're staying at Earl's?"

"I don't think he'll kick me out of bed."

Carol returns her attention to Eugene. "Have you been to Henry's new pub at Oceanside?" She thinks it must have opened by now.

"I have indeed, before embarking on this speed boat, and I have no complaints about the products I imbibed, but I've heard that Jamestown's tavern is – no slight to your son – better staffed."

Carol smiles. "Well I hope you enjoy your stay. How long will you be here?"

"The boat returns in two night," Cyndie replies. She glances at Captain McBride. "I suppose you can put me up until then?"

He tilts his head slightly. "Gladly."

Gunther, who is heading to a garden plot alongside the docks, stops when he sees the speed boat and mutters, "Damn it." He marches on.

"What's the source of his discontent?" Eugene asks.

"Dianne's coming back to Oceanside with us," Cyndie tells him. "We've missed her on the council. She and Gunther are a couple. She's been here a month. He's probably not happy to see the boat dock. I guess he got out of jail?"

"He got a light a sentence," Carol tells her.

Rosita pulls out a thick stack of letters from the inside pocket of her vest and hands them to Carol. "I figure you can deliver them. You know your people better than I do. Though most of them are for you and Daryl."

[*]

Daryl is a bit like a kid on Christmas when Carol gives him his letters after dinner that evening. Judith, Aaron, and Hershel have written him. "Never got mail in the old world." He slumps in his armchair and rips one open. Sweetheart lays sleepily on the bear skin rug on her stomach, petting Dog before the fire that gives them light.

Carol settles onto the couch and reads her letter from Henry. "Oh shit!"

Daryl looks up from Judith's girlish cursive. "What?"

She sighs. "Rachel's pregnant."

Daryl goes back to reading his letter.

"Daryl, did you hear what I said?"

"Yeah? So? They're married."

"Henry's much too young to be a father!"

"Ain't too young to knock 'er up."

"I thought they were waiting a few years. I thought they were being careful."

"Shit happens," Daryl mutters. "Can't always pull out on time. 'S why the Barrons got VanDaryl."

Carol's a little annoyed at how nonplussed he is. "More to the point," she says, "I'm too _young_ to be a grandmother."

"Y'll make a sexy grandmother," he assures her.

"There's nothing sexy about grandmothers. Sweetheart's niece or nephew is going to be less than three years younger than her!" She tosses the letter on the coffee table, but when the nervous, worried flutter in her stomach subsides, she smiles ever so slightly.


	189. Chapter 189

Daryl yawns widely in the crude deer blind halfway up a high tree. He could fall asleep here. Good thing he's got Mitch to poke him awake before he slouches too far left and topples out through the weak, camaflouging branches that form the side wall. It's not just that this way of hunting is boring – though it is. It's that Carol didn't sleep well last night, so he didn't sleep well last night.

She was tossing and turning, and not mainly because Eugene was snoring on their couch after a late night drinking and pontificating to the waitresses at the tavern. She's worried about Henry and Rachel, about her son becoming a father, about becoming a grandmother herself. She's worried but she's also excited and a little bit happy. Daryl could tell from that small smile that graced her lips last night when she thought about the baby to be. A _grandchild_. It's a symbol of a world that is finally settling, of a humanity that is pressing on.

Mitch lowers his binoculars. The deer feed remains untouched. They got two at once the last time they did this, so Daryl agreed to do it again, though he hates hunting this way. It feels almost like cheating, but he supposes it's no different than setting and checking traps, which he's happy to do. He just _likes_ the hunt, the thrill of tracking, the chase.

He and Mitch talk, in quiet voices, because there's not much else to do. They'll grow silent at the first sing of prey. "Just makes her feel old," Daryl murmurs in conclusion as he shares the news.

"Does it make you feel old?"

"Hell would it make me feel old for?" Daryl asks.

"Well, you're going to be a grandfather."

"Nah I ain't."

"Uh…yeah. You are."

"Henry ain't my son. I didn't raise 'em."

"Yeah…but, you're Carol's husband. Henry may not know you as Dad, but all that baby's going to know you as is Grandpa."

Suddenly Daryl doesn't feel like yawning. It didn't even occur to him that Carol becoming a Grandma meant he was becoming a Grandpa. "Shit."

Mitch chuckles. "Don't worry, you'll be the cool grandpa. The one with the old war stories from a time when the world wasn't so soft and easy."

"But 'm still _Daddy_. Can't be Granddaddy."

"Well, you'll always be Daddy to Sweetheart, even when you're ninety, if you raise her to be a good southern girl."

"Pffft." Mitch is not wrong, though. "Fuckin' kid," Daryl mutters. "Couldn't keep in his pants a few more years?"

Mitch laughs. "Would you, at eighteen, if you'd had a willing girl?"

"Nah," Daryl admits. He gets why Carol is also upset. The kids are too young, not even out of their teens yet, either one of them. But Daryl doesn't blame Henry for not being able to stick to the don't-knock-her-up schedule Father Gabriel helped him to concoct. Natural Family Planning, he called it. There's no way Daryl could keep it in his pants on certain days of the month if he'd had opportunity (which he seldom did). He didn't have the discipline to pull out back then either. Hell, he doesn't have the discipline now. "Well, ain't like we're gonna see 'em much."

"Unless they move here to be near the grandparents," Mitch suggests. "People sometimes do when they have kids. For the help."

"Got a whole damn village full of women to help. 'N Henry just opened his pub. Rachel's on the council, or whatever the hell Oceanside calls it. Don't see 'em movin'." Though Carol would no doubt like them to, and in that letter she was frantically writing when he left his morning, she probably asked them to.

"Shhhh…" Mitch whispers as he clicks his safety off his rifle.

They fall silent as a small group approaches the feed. They leave the yearling and its mother, but take the buck and a second doe. At least ninety pounds of meat, Daryl thinks, dressed and boned and butchered. Maybe as much as a hundred.

"Well I'm getting laid tonight," Mitch says as he scurries down from the blind. "James loves venison."

"Rations won't come out for a week," Daryl reminds him as he plops down on the ground and draws his gutting knife.

"It's the _anticipation_ that's the best part."

Daryl crouches by the buck and makes his initial incision. "When ya gonna make an honest man out of 'em?"

Mitch laughs as he helps him to field dress the deer. "Marriage? I don't think that's happening. It's a May September romance. He'll move on eventually, especially with our world growing."

"Been longer 'n that," Daryl says. "Been almost a year."

"I didn't mean from May to September. A May September romance means…" Mitch chuckles. "Never mind. You want the antlers, or can I have them this time?"

[*]

Carol patrols past the storehouse and finds the door slightly ajar and sees movement inside. She enters cautiously and has a strange sense of de ja vu, but it's not Raul rifling through the boxes for a "let's go steady" ring for Enid this time. It's Gunther. He stumbles back, startled, when she walks in.

"Oh, hey," he says.

She smiles knowingly.

"It's not what you think," he insists.

"No?"

"Well, it _is_ what you think, but I'm by no means assured of my reception." He runs a hand through his thick salt-and-pepper hair. "I know it's too soon to ask, but Dianne's leaving on that speed boat tomorrow. I want her to come back, and when she does, I want her to _stay_. I doubt she'll give up her place as an advisor at Oceanside without this kind of assurance. And she may not want to at all. So please don't mention it to anyone. Including Daryl."

"Daryl's my husband."

"Well tell him not to mention it to anyone then," Gunther insists.

"My lips are sealed. And so are Daryl's."

He turns back to the box on the shelf, sifts through the rings, and sighs. "I think all the diamond ones are gone now. Jamestown has been using them for grinding and drilling, and then I heard Eugene came in yesterday and bought out most of what was left."

"Eugene? Why?"

"For the engineering team to use in the batteries. Or to use to help make the batteries. I don't know. I don't understand any of that magic. How does salt in ponds make batteries?"

"I don't know either," Carol admits. "I just stood guard while they mined."

"Good thing we have people who _do_ know these things. They might even be more important than farmers and hunters and warriors again one day. The sun is setting on our kind."

"The sun will never set on our kind," she assures him. "Society will always need food and protection."

"I suppose you're right. But we won't be this high on the totem poll forever. No one was ever impressed in the old world when I told them I was a farmer. Now, I finally get some _respect_. But I'll probably be dead by the time the nerds inherit the earth again."

Carol chuckles. "Nothing wrong with nerds." As long as they can kill a walker, too.

"That sneaky, quiet, VanDaryl kid, for instance, you can see the wheels turning in his tiny head. He's going to invent something miraculous one day, I can just see it."

"I could see that, too," Carol replies, "Though Daryl always says he'll make a stealthy hunter, so, who knows."

"Gary's going to be an adventurer. He'll probably join the Jamestown Navy. Maybe a trade team. Be a scavenger or a rakish diplomat. How about Sweetheart? What do you think?"

"I couldn't guess. It's a little early."

Gunther shrugs. He fishes out a ring with a large sapphire setting and two other jewels around it. "What do you think?"

"Uhh…" Carol tries to hide her wince.

"Too gaudy?"

"A little. Dianne's…"

"Utilitarian?" Gunther asks.

"I wouldn't put it _that_ way."

He holds up two matching platinum bands. "Maybe I should skip the engagement ring and just show her these when I ask?"

"They're stylish," Carol says. "Simple. Elegant."

He slides the thicker one on his ring finger. "Haven't worn one of these in years." He slides it back off again. "Think she'll say yes?"

"I couldn't guess. I think she loves you, though."

"Mhmhm. I can't for the life of me fathom why, but she does seem to. She could have her pick of younger Jamestown men I'm sure. They've been hitting on her all month, sometimes right in front of me."

"And I haven't had to break up any fights?" Carol asks with a teasing smirk.

"I'm keeping my nose clean. I've got a record now. I can't risk even a misdemeanor. And everyone knows it, so some of those men push my buttons just for fun." He slips the rings into his pocket. "Well, wish me luck. I took the day off. We're rowing out to the light house island."

"Good luck," Carol tells him and leaves him to continue her rounds. It seems like a lot of people are taking the day off. Sheriff Earl is out in back of his half of the duplex-cabin he now shares with Oliva, Jeremy, and their baby Hope, rocking and whittling away at a hunk of wood. Rosita sits in the rocking chair next to his, holding his son Benjamin – and that's how everyone thinks of the baby now – as Earl's son, even if he doesn't look a thing like him.

Carol stops to chat for a moment and thinks Rosita looks surprisingly natural with a baby in her arms. She says as much.

"I know I don't exactly come across as the nurturing type," Rosita says. "But I had three little brothers and a single father raised us. So I half-raised my brothers."

"You had a single father?" Earl asks. "You never told me that."

"He was a good man. Men who have the strength to stand up and raise their children alone…" She smiles at him lightly. "I admire that."

Earl smiles back. "Luckily I don't have to do it completely alone. Olivia feeds him. Jeremy big brothers him. And…uh…he likes your visits very much I'm sure. You should come more often."

"The boat only comes once a month."

"And why is that?" Earl looks at Carol. "We should have twice a month mail trips, shouldn't we? It only takes a few hours to get here, and with this new team working on manufacturing replacement batteries, we don't have to worry about the battery wearing out too soon from overuse do we?"

"Assuming they succeed," Carol says, "I suppose not. You could come to the open town hall and propose a more frequent mail route."

"It takes me a day to travel on horseback to Oceanside from Alexandria," Rosita warns him. "And then I stay overnight to catch the boat. And then I stay overnight here. Two nights this time. And I night at Oceanside on the way back. Even if that boat comes twice a month, that doesn't mean _I_ will. I _do_ have council and guard duties. I can't be gone eight nights a month."

"Well….maybe I could venture to Oceanside once a month and we could meet up there."

"You could get away with that?" Rosita asks. "The Sheriff?"

"I have an acting Sheriff. Santiago. He can fill my shoes as needed. Olivia and Jeremy would be willing to handle Benjamin for two to four days. Especially if I pay them in tobacco."

"Then it's a date."

Earl looks at Carol. "Well, we have to get it past the council first."

Carol smiles. "I make no promises. But I think a more frequent mail cycle is a good idea." Especially now that Rachel is pregnant. She wants regular _news_. And when the baby is born – she's taking the next speedboat back to Oceanside. Of course, the baby is due in late January, and the river will likely be unnavigable by then. She probably won't see her grandchild until mid-March. Her _grandchild_. She's still having trouble wrapping her mind around that.

Carol's still thinking about her grandchild-to-be, with mixed fear, worry, hope, and excitement, when she patrols on.


	190. Chapter 190

Dante and some laborers are returning from an outside forest with a horse and cart full of freshly cut lumber when Mitch and Daryl get back from the hunt. The men help them stack the lumber to the side of the museum for drying and then toss the deer on the cart to be taken to the butcher. Mitch goes up with it, but Daryl and Dante linger behind.

"Whatcya buildin'?" Daryl asks as they walk toward the museum to wash up in the men's employee locker room.

"A cabin," Dante days. "That hut's tiny. By the time the baby's walking…Inola says she's going to want a bigger place. The Council is comping me some of the materials and hours because that will free up the hut for future housing."

"Lucky you. I had to use m'own tobacco to buy labor from some asshole to build mine."

Dante grins. "You just didn't bother to make a reasonable application. Who knows what they might have given you."

"How's Inola?" Daryl's learned to make small talk. It took him an apocalypse and almost ten years, but he can do it now. Besides, he likes Inola and legitimately wants to know.

"Ready for it to come out. Waking up in the middle of the night with Charlie horses, keeping me up walking them off. You don't know what that part's like."

"Yeah, well, know the baby'll keep ya up more." Daryl pushes open the door of the men's employee locker room and goes to the third of the three sinks to begin scrubbing the dirt and blood from his hands. Dante leaves a sink between them as he washes up.

A sign on the doors to the toilets says – _Water restrictions in effect until August by order of the Council. If it's yellow, let it mellow._

"I wonder which of our wives came up with that little ditty," Dante says. He slaps the faucet off. "Better hurry up."

Daryl does, cleaning his flesh as fast as he can under the warm, running stream. He wonders if Carol crafted that sign and how long they had to spend debating the water restrictions. He's glad leadership hasn't fallen on his shoulders here in Jamestown. He did his part in the past, and it would be a lie to say he didn't enjoy the respect, but he never really wanted the burden of making people's decisions for them. It was one thing in a time of war and day-to-day survival, but he couldn't stand doing it in so ordered and settled a world, with so many rules and procedures for how decisions get made, and so many rules to make.

He sat across a council table from Carol in the prison, but that was a different time and a different place. He doesn't want to sit across the table from her here. He loves the freedom of the hunt, where he's the only one making the rules, and the only table he wants to share with her these days is the dinner table, eating her delicious cooking and listening to the soothing, happy chatter of their child.

Daryl slaps off the faucet, shakes the excess water off his hands, and then dries them by running them through his hair.

"They've got towels," Dante tells him as he dries his hands on one hanging from a ring.

They part ways when they exit the bathrooms, Dante down the hall toward a back door and Daryl down the hall past the infirmary toward the daycare. When he sees Raul and Enid inside the clinic, working on blending herbs into medicines, he stops to say hello. "Stayin' awhile?" he asks Enid.

"Yeah, I'm not going back with the mail boat tomorrow," Enid replies. "I'm staying until the next one. Jesus and Aaron are on top of things back home, and my apprentice is really stepping up."

"Good to see ya. How's Hershel?"

"Still growing like a weed," Enid tells him. "He starts at the lower school next month."

They talk a bit longer, and then Daryl heads on toward the daycare. He's walking down the hall when he hears a familiar voice behind him: "Up to no good?"

He turns an smirks at Carol. "Gonna arrest me, deputy?"

"I suppose not. I'm off duty in five minutes. I packed a lunch for Sweetheart. Want to leave her a little longer and take your wife out to lunch at the tavern?"

Daryl snakes an arm around her and pulls her close. "S'pose I could take m'girl out to lunch." He nuzzles her neck and kisses that especially sensitive spot that curves into her shoulder.

She pulls away, chuckling. "We better hurry if we want to get there before the mid-day closing. It takes a while to walk that far, and I know you aren't getting on a bicycle."

"Got m' _real_ bike out back of the museum. Wanna ride?"

Carol does want a ride, and she wraps her arms tightly around him as the motorcyle roars down the docks and kicks up dirt on the path that winds its way to the Village.

[*]

Eugene is just leaving when they arrive. "See you back at dinner time, honey!" Candy calls after him.

Eugene pauses before the saloon doors, which are still swaying from Carol and Daryl's entrance, and says to Candy, "I see you have assessed the data and extrapolated a pattern of behavior."

"I don't know what that means, sweetheart, but I know when a man's become a regular. It's too bad you're leaving tomorrow."

Eugene seems pleased by that statement and nods a greeting to Carol and Daryl. "The soup today is, for lack of a more accurate descriptor, hunky dory."

"Good," Daryl grunts.

"Is your couch available for the proverbial surfing again tonight?"

"You're welcome to sleep on our couch," Carol tells him.

"I'll be out of your hair for dinner though," Eugene assures them. "Candy is correct in her assessment with regard to my culinary plans. I did happen to stumble upon a small cache of ammunition and I would be remiss not to put it to good use while I'm here. I'd stay and partake of an adult beverage with you two if I did not have a meeting with your electrician at 1400 hours."

Daryl's already left before Eugene's quite finished speaking, and he slides onto a stool at the bar. Carol, detained a little longer, soon joins him.

"Your friend talks funny," Candy tells them as she rests on her crutches and Trisha dries out a pint glass.

"He does have a unique way with words," Carol agrees.

"He's a peculiar bird," Candy says. "But he sure does like it here. I think he's spent over ten hours here since that speedboat docked."

"He likes the captive audience," Trisha suggests.

Soon, Daryl and Carol have bowls of soup and pint glasses before them.

"Hey, handsome!" Candy calls as Daryl picks up his spoon.

Carol turns slightly to see Thomas entering the tavern. He takes a seat two stools away from Carol, as though not wanting to impose by sitting too closely. "Just a beer please. I ate already."

Candy, resting her weight on her good ankle, pours him one. "No lunch with Laura today?" she asks as she slides the pint glass across the bar. There's a hint of woundedness in her voice.

"I couldn't possibly afford to take her out every day."

"Well, she could take _you_ out, you know," Candy tells him. "She earns tobacco rations, too."

"It's not like she's my girlfriend."

"But you want her to be, don't you?" Candy asks.

"She's been through a lot" is all Thomas will reply.

"Haven't we all," Candy says with a sigh.

Trisha shoots Candy a sympathetic glance and then goes to serve a couple by the fire.

"No Eugene?" Thomas asks. "I thought he'd be here every open hour until he headed back."

"He had a meeting," Candy says.

"I never thought about what it must be like to be a bartender," Thomas muses. "You have no choice but to talk to people."

"It's not so bad, talking to him."

"Ya mean _listenin'_ to 'em talk?" Daryl asks.

Candy chuckles. "I don't mind. I feel bad for him. He seems lonely. I think he's a _virgin_." She looks at Carol, as if for confirmation, but Carol says nothing. Daryl busies himself with his soup.

"I can't imagine how he wouldn't be," Thomas replies.

"Oh, now don't be mean!" Candy scolds.

"You're the one who said it!"

"Well it just seems like he probably is," Candy replies. "I'm thinking of offering to pop his cherry for him."

Daryl chokes on his soup, coughs, and works it down after thumping his chest with a balled up fist. Carol looks at him with a faintly amused smile.

"You said you were done with that!" Thomas cries with alarm. "I really though you meant it."

Trisha has returned now and dips an empty pint glass in a tub of soapy water. "You did promise you were done. How can you not be, after what you went through? Didn't you mean it?"

"I _did_ mean it," Candy insists. "I'm not talking about turning a _trick_. I'm talking about a freebie."

"A pity fuck?" Trisha asks. Then she flushes as though remembering other people are at the bar. "Excuse my French."

"Well I probably don't have to worry about STDs," Candy says. "And it's not like I wouldn't enjoy it. Virgins are the _best_. They're always so eager and _grateful_. And the look on their faces. I just _love_ the look on their faces."

Daryl seems more annoyed than embarrassed by the conversation, but Thomas is ear to ear red. "You can't be serious," Thomas says.

"Why not? I think it would be nice of me."

"So you're just going to offer to have sex with him, and then he leaves tomorrow, and that's that?" Thomas asks.

Candy shrugs.

"I thought you wouldn't want to do that after…" he trails off. "I thought you were done with that. Completely."

" _Sex_?" Candy laughs. "Oh God, no. I don't think I'll ever be done with sex. I like sex. One asshole isn't going to change that, especially not one that got what he deserved."

"Oh," Thomas says.

"I better start wiping down the last of the tables." Candy grabs a rag and hobbles away with the crutches beneath her arms.

"You think she'll really do it?" Thomas asks Trisha.

"Why do you care if she does?"

"Don't you care?"

"I don't think it's the smartest thing she can do," Trisha says. "But I don't think it's the dumbest thing she's ever done either. But you ought ask yourself why it bothers you so much." Trisha winks at him and then goes to pour some moonshine into two shot glasses.

[*]

Sweetheart's sound asleep with Dog beside her bed. Daryl's bow strings are waxed and Carol's rifles are cleaned. The kitchen is swept and the dishes done. They slump onto the couch, and Carol eases into the crook of Daryl's arm before laying her head on his shoulder.

"Think Eugene's getting his cherry popped?" Daryl asks.

"I don't know," Carol replies. Candy's not staying in the tavern's loft these days, not with those crutches. The tavern's supply closet has been unloaded, the goods put in the loft, and Candy given that as a bedroom. Gunther and Thomas brought down all her furnitrue and belongings. She has a closed-door room now. She has the privacy for _vistors_. "The tavern doesn't close for half an hour, though."

They're quiet for a few minutes. Daryl stares at the empty hearth. It's too hot for a fire, and only the oil lamp lights the living room. "Miss TV," he mutters.

"Do you really?"

"Dunno. Most shows were shit. Maybe just miss havin' somethin' to stare at when there ain't nothin' has to be done. Used to be a good reason not to talk."

"You don't have to talk when you don't want to you, know. Not with me."

He lets out a content sigh, and they don't talk, not for several minutes, until Carol says, "What was your favorite TV show?"

"Thought ya said I don't have to talk?"

"You don't. You can just not answer."

"Pffft. Bet that would go over like a led balloon."

Carol smiles. "I used to watch Jerry Springer."

Daryl snorts. "Nah."

"I did. It made me feel better about my own life. I'd say, well, at least I know who the father of my child is. At least he wouldn't throw a chair at me in _public_. _On stage._ Only behind closed doors."

"Damn."

"There was this show that came out, right toward the end. _Supernanny_. I loved that, too. I thought, at least I don't let my kid talk to me like that. At least I don't let my kid run around with an axe in the back yard."

"'S wrong with that? How else's the kid s'posed to chop wood?"

"This kid wasn't chopping wood."

"Mhm. I always liked _Cops_."

Carol laughs. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. Like ya said, I'd think, well, least I ain't stupid 'nuff to take a swing at the cops when they try to put me in the back of the car. 'N I know a chokehold's illegal."

Carol snuggles in a little more. "Are you coming to see me debate this weekend?"

"Ya gotta do that again?"

"Every year, before every election."

"Ain't nothin' new to say, is there?"

"Well, there's a lot new. People are going to want to know our positions on strengthening the Alliance, increasing the number of mail deliveries and trade trips, how much we're willing to invest in this joint power project, what kind of threat the people we left behind at those apartments might be…I think there's going to be a lot of questions to answer, actually."

"Be there," he assures her. He settles his head against hers, and he drifts off to sleep there, sitting up.


	191. Chapter 191

Daryl doesn't know if Eugene gets his cherry popped by Candy, but he never comes to sleep on their couch. At noon the next day, he seems uncharacteristically quiet as he boards the speed boat. Gunther, meanwhile, seems uncharacteristically irritated. He kisses Dianne goodbye only on her cheek and then throws himself a bit angrily into digging up a vegetable garden at the side of the docks as the boat pulls off.

"Hell's up with him?" Daryl asks Carol as they stroll on toward the museum to deposit Sweetheart at the daycare before they both begin work. She walks slightly ahead of them, half-running down the deck, her little shoes tripping on the floor board while she babbles to herself. They can make out a word here and there – wawa for water, ffffwish, bow-t for boat.

"It seems Dianne shot down his proposal. He proposed. Marriage."

"Yeah, well, figured he didn't propose buildin' a football stadium at Oceanside."

Carol smiles. "Someday, maybe. Sweetheart's kids might."

"Pfffft." Daryl half cranes his neck back to look at the now distant man thrusting the shovel into the yielding earth and looks forward again. "Hell she say no for? He's a'right. Rich. Got a shit ton of tobacco. Treats 'er a'right."

"She just thinks it's a little soon for that kind of commitment. She didn't break up with him. She's planning to come with the next boat at the end of July and stay the night. And twice in August, since we're probably going to double the mail runs. And twice in September and October. And then she said when he comes for the trade trip in November, if they're still together…he should propose again. I suppose it wasn't a shoot-down so much as a delay. I think he's more embarrassed than angry, really."

"Glad ya didn't shoot me down when I asked. Wouldn't never have asked again."

"No?"

"Uh-huh."

Carol threads fingers through his. "I think you would have."

"Pffft."

"I know you."

"Yeah. Keep tellin' yerself that."

[*]

The council debates go fairly smoothly that evening, and Daryl keeps a would-be-babbling Sweetheart quiet in the back, as quiet as he can anyway. There are a lot of questions about the salt mining, about whether the people left behind are a threat or might become trade partners, about increasing he traffic between Jamestown and the rest of the alliance, about whether the trade trip in November can take more people. Carol does well.

This time, when election day rolls around, Daryl doesn't rush to the polls at the last minute. He goes first thing in the morning, soon after they open, before the hunt.

He takes his ballot from the court reporter and when he assumes his place behind the carboard divider on the long table, he immediately puts a 1 next to Carol and a 2 next to Garland.

Then he scans the rest of his choices.

 _Dr. Ibrahim Ahmad_

Maybe, Daryl thinks.

 _Commander James Witherspoon_

Maybe, Daryl thinks.

 _Assistant Farm Manager Gunther Hamilton_

Yeah. Of course. Man makes sure they have stores of food. He puts a 3 next to Gunther.

 _Deputy Sarah Dominguez_

It takes Daryl a second to process who that is. Sarah has officially taken Santiago's last name, it seems. He likes her. She's one of the Kingdom people. She knows more about hard living than most people on this ballot, and Carol's going to want some female company on that council. He puts a 4 next to Sarah's name.

 _Dr. Carolyn Taylor_

Maybe, Daryl thinks.

 _Deputy Thomas Mayfield  
_  
Hell no. Dumbass got himself captured by crazy cult ladies and almost got Carol killed.

 _Captain Arnold McBride_

Maybe. But doesn't he have enough work to do already as Captain? And if Daryl is going to pick one Navy man, it's going to be Witherspoon. Known entity and all. He's been on the council, knows how it works. Nothing against the Captain, the man seems good at his job, but he strikes Daryl as a little…well, not _council material_ , exactly.

 _Lieutenant-Commander Jeffery Lawson_

That asshole's running again? Even after his _demotion_? Hell no!

 _Deputy Andrew Davies_

Hell no. Man clearly thinks about his wife's tits too much, enough to draw them big on that museum display, anyway. And Carol says he's a bit of a slacker at his job. That even though he's married to Trisha, Daryl still sees him flirt with the dairy girls.

 _Madame Linda Cartwright_

She's got serious management skills, and Daryl guesses that's what a town takes - management. He puts a 5 next to the tavernkeeper's name.

 _Mr. Raul Dominguez_

The kid sneaked himself on the ballot at the last minute. He's only been back from the Hilltop for three weeks. He's got some balls. But the council could use a younger voice. The future and all that shit. Then again, if Raul's going to end up spending two or three months of the year at the Hilltop, he shouldn't be on the Council. Then again, maybe he should. He could be like a diplomat, too. Daryl puts a 6 next to his name.

Three more. Might as well go for the doctor. He puts a 7 next to Dr. Ihmad's name. The veterinarian's a bit of a Debbie Downer as Shannon calls her, but Daryl figures they need a voice of caution, just make sure they aren't doing any dumb shit like they sometimes used to do back in Alexandria, like killing all those Saviors at the outpost without knowing how big the group was first. He puts an 8 next to Carolyn's name. Then he puts a nine next to Witherspoon.

He folds his ballot and steps back and sees Inola voting next to him. Then he looks down and sees his foot is planted in a wet spot on the industrial carpet. Did she just pee?

"Shit!" Inola curses and then just keeps peeing.

It's another couple seconds before Daryl realizes she isn't peeing. He realizes it about the time Dr. Emily, who is also voting, takes her by the shoulders and says, "Come on, the infirmary is the closest bed, let's get you there, get some towels, and check you."

"Get Dante!" Inola calls as she walks out of the council chambers with the doctor, and Daryl nods dumbly.

"Water broke," he says to the court reporter.

The older woman, who is usually of few words and semi-stern demeanor, says, "No shit Sherlock. Are you getting Dante or not?"

Daryl walked down to the docks this morning. He didn't take his motorcycle. So he's forced to grab one of the bicycles – a dirt bike with thick towers – and pedal his way across the docks. He's halfway down them when he realized he forgot to ask where Dante actually is. He pauses by the garden Gunther is now leaving and asks if he knows. "It's his day off. He's probably working on his new cabin in the addition to the settlement. Why?"

"Baby's coming."

Daryl pushes down against the pedal, pumps, and flies on. He stops at his own cabin to get his real bike, though, and kick starts it before roaring into the far end of the settlement, where the trapezoidal fence forms an addition. Sure enough, Dante is digging the base. He drops his shovel when Daryl shouts, "Baby's coming!" and waves Daryl off the motorcycle.

Daryl's reluctant to surrender his bike at fist, but Dante's one hell of a lumberjack. They aren't going to be able to cuddle close, and he dismounts and watches Dante, and his bike – disappear toward the museum.


	192. Chapter 192

Inola has a baby girl. They name her after Inola's sister, who was lost early in The Great Sickness, Yona, which means "bear."

"Glad 's a girl," Daryl tells Carol after the news spreads and they're tucked into their cabin for the night.

"Why do you care?" Carol asks.

"One less boy to chase Sweetheart in fifteen years."

Carol smiles. "How do you know the girls won't be chasing her, too?"

Daryl glowers. Then he shrugs.

The Council election results come in the next morning. The people of Jamestown like consistency. Not much changes. Garland, Carol, Dr. Ahmad, Gunther, Carolyn, Deputy Thomas, and Commander Witherspoon are all re-elected. The spots that were vacated by Inola and Barry stepping down are the only changes. They're filled by Madam Linda and Captain McBride. Raul is disappointed by his loss, but he plans to run against next year. Deputy Andrew, after two losses, however, grumbles that he's done putting himself before the voters. Besides, Trisha's "as pregnant as a house" in his words, and she won't be able to wait tables soon, though she's still waddling her way around the tavern a few shifts a week. The men courteously go on the back porch to smoke when she's waitressing.

Dr. Ahmad and Carolyn both throw their hats into the ring against Garland for the mayor's position, though Carol lays low this time around. She doesn't want to appear too presumptuous by running now. Garland, predictably, wins in a landslide.

"Well, I guess I can wave goodbye to you for another year, baby," Shannon mutters over a dinner they all share in the Barron family cabin. The kids have already been fed and play together on the floor, with Gary trying to direct the show and VanDaryl and Sweetheart having none of his commands.

"It's my duty, darling," Garland replies.

"Oh, admit it, baby. Part of you _likes_ the attention. All those women looking up to you. _Mayor Barron_."

"Not _all_ of them," he grumbles.

"I admire you," Shannon assures him. "That's why I want more time with you."

"Well," Garland says, "I won't be as busy this time around, what with Carol as my lieutenant mayor."

Daryl stops chewing. "What?" Carol asks.

"I get to appoint my own lieutenant mayor," Garland replies. "I'm appointing you. If you're willing."

"I…yes! I'm definitely willing." This will be an excellent opportunity to learn the ropes. "I just assumed you'd appoint Dr. Ahmad."

Garland smiles slightly. "He's a decent and intelligent man, but he's not going to be the next mayor of Jamestown."

Daryl catches Carol's eyes over the table, and he smiles a little proudly. She smiles back.

"No!" Van Daryl shouts suddenly. "My car!"

Where she stands in the living room, half leaned against the couch, Sweetheart looks at the mathchbox car in her hand, looks at VanDaryl, and then reluctantly hands it back to him. Her little bottom lip quivers, and she makes the slightest sound as if she's about to cry.

VanDaryl thrusts out the car to her. The tremoring lip ceases its movement, and Sweetheart takes it back with a smile.

"It's mine, actuwahlee," Gary tells the younger children. "But you two can share. Share. Share _nice_. Or I'll smack you."

"You won't be smacking anyone," Garland warns him. "You don't have the authority to be smacking anyone, and that's no way to resolve disputes."

"I'll raise my voice," Gary threatens instead.

Sweetheart abandons the matchbox car on the couch, walks over to the stern-looking preschooler, and throws her arms around him, as best she can, given his superior height, in a conciliatory hug. Gary pries her arms off of himself, shakes his head, and goes to get his pop gun, which he sits on the floor and cleans with a cloth and a little wooden ramming rod as if it were as a real rifle.

"When did he start talking?" Carol asks. "It's the first time we've heard VanDaryl say a word. And he uses _three_? A _sentence_? With a pronoun? At only fourteen months old?"

"He started talking yesterday," Shannon replies. "All at once, as if he'd been saving it up." She puts a hand over Garland's on the table and squeezes. "Garland was so relieved."

"So were you."

"I wasn't worried," Shannon insists, and Garland chuckles. "Not _too_ worried," Shannon concedes.

"He doesn't talk often," Garland says. "And he talks a little loudly, because he can't hear himself in that one ear. We'll have to train him out of that. But for now…we're just happy for the words."

[*]

Carol shadows Garland for the next week. There's more to learn than she realized, and his job is more detailed than she expected. "You _are_ running again for mayor next year, aren't you?" she asks him them as they pour over some papers at his desk.

"Why? You don't want to seize the reins next year?"

"Not quiet yet. I could probably use two years of training. And you're already hearing a lot of grumbling about having chosen me for lieutenant mayor, I suppose. Because gives me an advantage over the other candidates when you _can't_ run anymore."

Garland shakes his head. "There's been very little grumbling. You have more than a few admirers. You aren't an outsider anymore. Not by a long shot."

"Jamestown has felt like home for a long time now," Carol says. "I just hope I can serve it well."

[*]

The Alliance, optimistic that the engineering team will be able to create a new battery from scratch materials and lithium mining within a year, agrees to send the mailboat _twice_ monthly. At the end of July, it returns, this time with Cyndie, Eugene, Rosita, Dianne, and Henry among its crew. Carol is thrilled for the visit by her son, though he hangs out at the tavern all afternoon, plying Linda for more advice.

"I don't know why I bothered to switch shifts," Carol grumbles as she fixes dinner and Daryl slides the top off of Stinky's tank so Sweetheart can drop a wood roach inside. "If he's not even going to spend time with me."

The little girl scream-laughs and stumbles backward as the lizard lunges for its meal. "Ewwww!" she says. Then "Yum! Hungwy stinky, yum!"

"He'll be back for dinner," Daryl assures her as he snaps the top back into place.

"Make sure you wash her hands after she's been handling bugs. And why do we have so many bugs?"

"Ain't got that many. Barely 'nuff to feed Stinky."

Henry does return in time for dinner, and Carol has a million questions for him about Rachel's pregnancy, his plans for the future, Oceanside, his life, and his new tavern. "What are you going to name the baby?"

"If it's a boy…Ezekiel."

"Oh." Carol hasn't forgotten Ezekiel, but she has a new a husband, the husband's she's always been meant to have, whil Henry will never have another father. "I think Ezekiel would have felt honored if he had known that."

"And for the middle name," Henry says, "Benjamin. After my brother, you know."

"Ezekiel Benjamin," Carol echoes. It's a mouthful, but she doesn't say that.

"Or maybe Benjamin Ezekiel. We haven't decided yet. But there's another little Benjamin here already, isn't there?"

"Sheriff Earl's boy," Daryl mutters. He's mostly staying out of the mother-son conversation. It's the first word he's said.

"And it's such a small world," Henry continues. "We're trying not to duplicate first names."

"Well, it won't be small for much longer," Carol assures him. "And we already have some duplicate names in the Alliance. We have a Rachel here, and yours at Oceanside. A couple of Joes. Two Lauras now that we brought in that cult girl.

"Oh, I heard about that little adventure," Henry says. "They say two of the men you brought back here are…" he winces as he whispers, "castrated?"

"What if it's a girl?" Carol asks, not interested in rehashing that horror story. "What will you and Rachel name it then?"

"Well, we'll incorporate Carol of course."

Carol blinks in surprise. "Really?"

"For a middle name," Henry clarifies. "No offense, but it's kind of an old lady's name."

Carol laughs, but Daryl scolds, "Don't call yer mamma an old lady. And that's hell of a thing to say, comin' from a guy who shares his name with a 15th century king."

Henry half rolls his eyes.

"And for the first name?" Carol asks.

"We haven't decided on a first name yet."

When the meal is done, and Daryl has taken Sweetheart to the washing trough to clean up, Henry clears the dishes with Carol. As they clean, he volunteers to "babysit" his little sister so Carol and Daryl can have an evening together at the tavern.

"I'd rather spend time with you," Carol tells him.

"What is Daryl? Chopped liver?" Henry asks with a smirk.

"I see Daryl every day. I see you once in a blue moon."

"You two should have a date night," Henry tells her. "And I should get to know my sister better. It's a win for everyone. Go."

"I don't know. I - "

"- It's not healthy for a marriage, Mom, to not get enough quality time together."

Carol rests the towel on the counter and looks at him warily. "Are you and Rachel having problems?"

"No! Why do you always have to think we're having problems?"

"I _don't_ have to. You just…what you just said. I was worried for a minute."

"We're _fine_ ," he assures her. "I just want to make sure you and Daryl are fine. You're lieutenant mayor now. He said it was a busy job, that he hasn't seen much of you this past week."

"When did he say that?"

The front door swings open and Daryl walks back inside with Sweetheart riding him piggyback. He squats down and she lets go and slides off onto the floor with a giggle.

"Henry's watching Sweetheart tonight so we can go to the tavern and get a drink. Spend some kid-free time together. For an hour or so," Carol says.

Daryl's face brightens, and Carol sees that Henry must be onto something. "Mhmhm," Daryl says. "Sounds good."


	193. Chapter 193

Daryl wants to sit at the end of the bar. It's his favorite spot, and the tavern is sparsely inhabited tonight, so they have their privacy there. "Do you think I'm spending too much time working?" Carol asks him after Trisha leaves them alone with their pint glasses.

He shrugs. "Just like havin' ya 'round more."

"I thought we spend a good amount of time together most evenings." After Sweetheart is in bed, they have their quiet evenings in the living room. They just made love two nights ago.

"Ain't that. Just…" He shrugs and sips his pint.

"Just what?" Carol insists gently.

"Didn't sign up to be Mr. Mom."

"Oh." This is not about missing _her_. "Daryl, you're Sweetheart's _father_."

"Know that." Daryl glances at her quickly before returning his attention to his pint glass. "And yer her mother."

Carol bites down the instinctive flare of annoyance and instead considers his concern. It's true that she's seen less of Sweetheart since becoming lieutenant mayor. Between her patrols and shadowing Garland and her work on the Council, three times this week she was only home in time to tuck the little girl in. The other four, she was home for dinner. But Daryl hunts early. He typically gets back around one in the afternoon, picks Sweetheart up from daycare, and is with her alone until Carol gets home. Daryl's accustomed to roaming, to fiddling with his bike, working on his bow, and doing other odds and ends which are difficult to accomplish with a toddler underfoot. He's glad to be here tonight at the tavern not because he needs more time with Carol, but because he needs more time to _himself_. He needs more time as an _adult_ not chained to a child.

"I'll scale back a little on the shadowing," she assures him. "I have whole year to learn the ropes. Maybe two, if Garland appoints me again next year. I'll try to get home earlier."

"Yeah?"

She slides and arm around his shoulders and kisses his cheek. "Yeah."

Daryl nods and sips from his beer.

Carol lets her arm fall down loosely around his waist. "And you know, you don't have to pick up Sweetheart as soon as you wash up from the hunt. I get an extra few rounds of ammo a week as lieutenant mayor. We can afford an extra hour of daycare each day. Take an hour to yourself before you pick her up."

"Feel bad just leavin' 'er there."

"Daryl, she has lots of little friends there. She loves Sherry. There's no reason to feel bad about it. You spend a lot of time with her. You're up before the sun. You work hard. You deserve the time to yourself. Without your girls in your hair." She brushes his bangs, which are growing long again, off his forehead.

Daryl smiles. "I like my girls."

"I know. But take the hour. Or two, if there's a day you need two."

He sets down his pint. "Yeah. Think I will."

Carol slides her arm off of him because Gunther has approached. "Mind if I join y'all?" he asks. Carol leaves it to Daryl to reply, because she's not sure if he wants company, but he says sure and nods to the stool next to himself, which Gunther slides onto.

Trisha approaches and pours the farmer a cup of tea without evening asking what he wants. Gunther's a regular after all. "Where's Dianne?" the waitress asks. "Did y'all break up after she shot down your marriage proposal?"

"No. She's just visiting some old Kingdom friends. She'll join me later."

"Gonna pop the question again?" Trisha pushes the tea cup forward and motions over the teenage waiter. "At the trade fair in November?"

"I don't know. I'm thinking I might wait for her to pop it. It would serve her right."

Trisha chuckles and hands over the kettle to the waiter. As the boy heads off to refill the kettle and return it to the fire, Gunther blows on the surface of his tea. Carol wonders if Dianne's waiting just to see if he maintains his sobriety. If so, he's been passing the test.

Trisha sets a hand on the bar near Gunther and turns her body slightly. "You see that?" She nods to the opposite end, where the bar curves into an L. Candy is using her crutches for support as she leans over the bar and kisses Eugene, who sits on the stool opposite.

"Yes, I've noticed that," Gunther replies. "It's peculiar."

"What's peculiar about it?" Trish asks. "They're getting married."

Daryl chokes on his beer, swallows it down, and pounds his chest. Gunther splutters his tea and then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. "What?" Daryl asks, the word buried in the assistant farm manager's rush to hiss, "They _just_ met on the last mail run."

"So?" Trisha asks nonchalantly.

"I thought she was just being nice by offering him a little…" Gunther trails off discretely.

"Yeah, but Candy's pregnant," Trisha whispers. "She just told him a couple hours ago, and he _proposed_."

"She _can't_ know that already," Gunther insists.

"That was just two weeks ago when Eugene first visited," Carol agrees.

"And Candy's not stupid," Gunther adds. "She never does anything that'll get her pregnant."

Trisha sighs and chews on her bottom lip before saying, quietly, "She's been pregnant _awhile_."

"Oh," Gunther says. He grits his back teeth together. "That sonofabitch."

"It's not the baby's fault," Trisha says. "She thought about, you know…But she decided she couldn't."

Candy has left the far end of the bar and begun to hobble her way over on crutches. She comes to a stop beside Trisha. "My ears are itching. Are y'all gossiping about me?"

"Did you get that poor man to have sex with you so he'd think that baby was his?" asks Gunther. "I knew you were mercenary, but…damn, Candy."

Candy rolls her eyes. "How stupid do you think Eugene is? He _knows_ it's not his."

"He knows, and he proposed…why?" Gunther asks.

"Gee, thanks."

"I didn't mean…I just…a man doesn't typically propose on two weeks' acquaintance," Gunther says.

"He's in love," Trisha says dreamily. "And maybe Candy's a romantic after all."

"I'm a pragmatist anyway," Candy admits. "Hopefully the baby won't inherit the sociopath gene."

"Oh don't say that!" Trisha insists. "Not with a decent daddy to raise him. And Eugene seems decent."

Candy looks at Carol. "I heard he played a clever trick on the Saviors that saved y'all from them."

"He did," Carol says. After he joined the enemy for quite some time, she thinks, but she doesn't emphasize that part of it. They've all made a lot of bad decisions over the years, too often trapped between a rock and a hard place.

"And he's on the council in Alexandria," Candy continues. "And an engineer. My daddy would fall over backward in his grave if he knew I'd managed to marry an _engineer_. And Eugene's got a stash of loot saved up. And a big bedroom all to himself in a house with _electricity_ and running water. Alexandria sounds like paradise."

"You're moving!" Trisha exclaims as though this is the first time she's considered the possibility that the marriage might result in Candy leaving instead of Eugene moving to Jamestown.

Candy shrugs. "Well, yeah, they have power and plumbing in _every_ house. And they don't have a tavern. They don't even have a distillery or a brewery yet. There's no one to distribute liquor properly in that town. I'm going to make and sell moonshine. No more waiting tables for me. I'm gonna call it Candy Shine."

"Candy Shine," Gunther echoes. "It's not a bad name."

"I took some marketing classes in the old world."

"But don't you think it's a bit of a rush?" Gunther asks. "You hardly know this man."

"Carol can vouch for him, right?"

"Not as a _husband_ ," Carol says.

"Look, I need to retire permanently from the whoring business. I need a daddy for this baby, and I could use a man of means who isn't going to hurt me. And Eugene needs a woman. It's a win-win for everyone involved."

"Candy?" Eugene calls from across the tavern. "Are we going to resume our QT?"

"I think that means quality time," Candy whispers. "Just a minute, honey bunny! I'll be right over."

"You can't leave!" Trisha whines. "I can wait all these tables by myself!"

"We've got the new boy," Candy tells her, nodding to the teenager who has just served two bowls of stew to a couple in the corner. "He'll go full-time. _Councilwoman_ Linda will take on another apprentice. You'll be fine."

"This is insane, Candy," Gunther tells her. "You _barely_ know him."

"This may be the last time I get to remind you of this, Gunther," Candy replies. "But you aren't my father."

"No, but I _do_ care about you."

Candy smiles faintly. "I know you do. And I'll miss you. Because God knows you'll never come visit in Alexandria. You've got a girlfriend in Oceanside, and even getting you _there_ is like pulling teeth." She glances back toward Eugene. "Well I better get back down to my fiancé. Y'all enjoy your evening." Crutches beneath her arms, she makes her way back to the far end of the bar.

"Did not see _that_ one comin'," Daryl mutters, and takes a long slow sip of his beer.

Carol and Daryl finish their beers, by which time Mitch and Commander Witherspoon have joined the bar, and someone suggests a round a poker. Carol trails her fingertips across the back of Daryl's shoulders as she slides off her barstool. "You stay and have fun with the boys," she tells him. "I'll go back and get Sweetheart to bed." She'll have a chance to visit with Henry, and Daryl will have a chance just to be Daryl instead of Daddy.

Daryl nods his appreciation, and Carol heads for the door.


	194. Chapter 194

The curtain rasps open and closed. There's a jangling of belt and zipper. The bed shifts and Daryl drapes a strong arm over Carol. He smells like smoke. She crinkles her nose. "Were you _smoking_?" Given the value of tobacco, she'd really prefer he not resume that habit.

"Nah. Dante and Gunther were. Some cigars Gunther rolled. Gunther wanted to congratulate 'em on the kid."

"Oh. I thought Dante quit?"

"Sorta. Ain't allowed to do it 'round 'Nola."

"Yeah?" Carol asks with a slight smirk. "What else do you boys do when your wives aren't around?"

"Went down to the strip club," he murmurs.

Carol laughs. "I don't think Jamestown has a strip club. And you're about as likely to go to one as to a revival meeting."

"Ain't much diff'rence. Both got someone up on stage tryin' to sell ya a fantasy." He settles his chin on her head. "Sorry didn't mean that as an insult to yer – "

" – I know. It was funny. In its way. Did you have a good time?"

"Yeah. Needed that. Thanks." He breathes in, dips his head, and nuzzles her neck with his nose. "Wanna fool 'round?"

She chuckles. "Not with Henry right there on the couch five feet away. Besides, what's the chance you have whiskey dick?"

"Zero." He thrusts against her slightly so she can feel his erection poking through his boxers.

"Tell your friend to stop knocking and come see me another night."

"'S already here."

"The house is all locked up for the night."

Daryl sighs and rolls on his back. Carol smiles and rolls to her side to settle her head on his shoulder. "I'm glad you had a good time with the boys. You have been spending a lot of time in the daddy department. I remember that with Sophia. Sometimes you just want to feel like an _adult_."

"'N what 'bout you?"

"What about me?"

"All ya do lately is work. Work at work. Work at home. It's work 'n work 'n Sweetheart. All work and no play makes Carol…dunno. Wha's it make Carol?"

"I play. We play. In the evenings sometimes."

"Yeah, but when ya got time to play with yerself?"

Carol hides her snort against Daryl's neck.

He chuckles.

"You'd like to see that wouldn't you?" she asks.

"'S a beautiful sight to see."

"I should probably get some extra alone time. Maybe at the range. It's relaxing."

"'N do it."

"When?"

"We'll figure it out." He squeezes her close and then his arm droops away. He might be horny, but he's even more tired, and he's asleep before she is.

[*]

At the Jamestown docks, Carol embraces her son and then pulls away. "You take good care of Rachel, you hear," she tells him. "Pregnancy can be exhausting."

"I will," he assures her. "I am. And I guess we'll see you at the trade trip in November?"

"If you don't come to visit on the mail boat before then," Carol hints.

"I have a pregnant wife to take care of, remember?" Henry says. "Besides, you could visit on the next mail boat."

"The mail boat isn't stored here. I'd have to stay two weeks. I can't get away that long." Not now that she's lieutenant mayor, though she will be gone for a week for the trade trip, because it involves a four to five day's round-trip journey by slow-sailing ship and two days at Oceanside.

"November," he promises her. "You can feel Rachel's belly."

Carol chuckles. "I'm not sure she's going to want me to do that."

"You can have a drink at Henry's Tiki Tavern, then."

"Is that what you're calling it?"

He shrugs. "That's what _they're_ calling it."

Harry gets on the boat behind Cyndie, who has recently kissed Captain McBride goodbye and is now readying the gears. Dianne is already standing in back and readying herself in the position of watchwoman, with bow and quiver on her back. Gunther has said his temporary goodbyes to her and is now saying his more permanent ones to Candy. He puts a hand on her shoulder. "If you change your mind, you know, if he doesn't treat you right, there's always the tavern."

"I assure you my treatment of Candy will be on the up and up, hunky dory, of the utmost – "

"Eugene, baby, can you wait for me on the boat?" Candy asks.

Eugene nods and takes the two bags she's packed with all of her earthly belongings and begins securing them on the boat.

"I'm going to be fine, _Pa_ ," she tells Gunther sarcastically. "We'll honeymoon at Oceanside for a night, and then it's off to my castle in Alexandria."

He sighs and lets his hand slide off her shoulder. "I hope you know what you're doing."

"I always know what I'm doing. Well, except when I do some dumb ass thing like get my best friend in trouble for killing some rapist – "

"- Don't," he interrupts her. "None of was not on you." He chuckles. "Your best friend, huh? I thought that was Trisha."

Candy shrugs. "A girl can have more than one. You take care of yourself, old man." She hugs him and then he helps her onto the boat.

The speed boat roars to life, and then Cyndie shouts to Rosita, who is still kissing Sheriff Earl goodbye against a picnic bench on the grass alongside the docks, "Mail boat's leaving! If you aren't on it in sixty seconds, you're staying for two weeks!"

Earl bends down and whispers something in Rosita's ear. Rosita smiles and waves her hand at the boat in a _go on then_ motion.

"Suit yourself," Cyndie calls, and the boat is off, kicking up a white stream on the river behind itself.

[*]

The birth and adoption record book, which remains in the Council Chambers, has been turned to a new page. Yet another baby joins the ranks of Jamestown in August – Sherry gives birth to a little boy, whom the couple names Dwight, Jr. The mail boat has come and gone again, and, once again, Rosita did not go home with it. The Council has given her some "temporary" work assignments, though nobody yet knows if it's really temporary, or if she's moving in permanently with Earl. Not even Earl knows. Maybe not even Rosita knows.

"We're going to need to add another worker to the daycare," Mayor Barron insists at the next Council meeting.

"We've got Dante and Inola's baby," Dr. Ahmad agrees, "Sherry and Dwight's, and Trisha's baby is due in early October."

"And Lieutenant Merriweather's knocked up his wife," Captain McBride says. "Kelley. The Kingdom beauty." He smiles at Carol. "The _other_ one," he adds apologetically.

Carol chuckles and shakes her head.

"She's due in December," Dr. Ahmad notes.

"How about Laura?" Deputy Thomas asks.

McBride's ruddy face is all stunned surprise. "You knocked her up? I didn't think you two had made it past second base."

"No! I meant to work at the daycare. She loves kids. And second base? What are we? In 3rd grade?"

"I was trying not to be crass," Captain McBride says. "I'm a little out of my element off a ship."

"I could sure use Laura to wait tables now that Candy is gone," Madame Linda says. "And Trisha can't be on her feet much longer, as pregnant as she is. I'll just have the boy soon."

"Hold up, hold up," Gunther insists. "Laura is on the fields!"

"It seems everyone is on the fields!" Thomas exclaims.

"Because it's August," Gunther tells him, "and the early fall harvest is just around the corner."

"Some harvest is always just around the corner with you," Linda grumbles.

"Forgive me for feeding the entire town, Linda."

"My beau feeds this town, too, you know," she tells him. "He's your boss as a matter of fact, _Assistant_ Farm Manager."

"Ernesto hasn't done any of the grunt work for almost a year," Gunther insists. "Would he like to get back out in the fields if you snatch up Laura from me?"

"Well, he's in poor health," Linda says. "His ticker, you know."

"You can put Laura's brother on the fields when we bring him back from Newport News," Thomas tells Gunther.

"Are you sure you can persuade him to come," Commander Witherspoon asks. "He didn't want to come the first time."

"When he sees how well Lauar's doing, he'll come," Thomas assures the Council.

"And what about he others?" Carolyn asks. "What if they want to come? We have no one to vouch for them. And there was some implication some of them might have been rapists in the past? Before the cult?"

" _If_ what the cult leader told Laura was true," Carol replies. "But something certainly messed those women up."

"We don't have to bring the others," Thomas says. "We can just bring Laura's brother. If that's what the Council decides."

It _is_ what the Council decides. They also decide on a team to check on the progress of the evaporation of the salt ponds in Hampton and on Laura's brother in Newport News. McBride will go, to Captain the ship, along with several sailors, while Commander Witherspoon will be in charge of the Navy here at Jamestown in his absence. Deputy Thomas will go, with Laura, to check on her brother. Santiago and Sarah, who are already familiar with the area from the last trip, will be assigned. Instead of Carol, they'll send Daryl this time, at her suggestion. She thinks he needs to stretch his legs and get out a little adventure-lust, and, besides, she could probably use some more one-on-one time with Sweetheart.

"Now that's decided," Garland says. "It's back to work assignments. We need a waiter or waitress and a childcare worker. The dorm is built, there's not a lot of construction right now, maybe we can take someone off of the building crew?"

"Well, Inola's not here to protest," Gunther observes.

"I think it would make more sense if we trained up a couple of teenagers getting ready to start an apprenticeship," Carol says. "Rather than pull someone with a different set of skills. Don't we have at least four kids who are going to turn thirteen within the next six months?"

"They need to learn real skills," Gunther says, "like farming."

"We're growing. Childcare _is_ a real skill, and one that's going to be increasingly in demand," Carol replies.

"We're growing," Gunther counters. "So we're going to have more and more mouths to feed. We need more farmers."

"I could always close down the tavern two or three days a week," Linda suggests.

"No!" Gunther, Commander Witherspoon, and Captain McBride shout in horrified unison.

"Then let's figure this out," Linda replies with a smirk.

The council assigns a teenage apprentice to the daycare. They reasign a young, twenty-something woman from the construction team to the Tavern, because Inola's work evaluations suggest has not proved a very competent builder. Perhaps she'll be better at waiting tables. "She better be," Linda mutters.

[*]

Daryl's wearing his tan work shirt, the one with jagged tatters from the sleeves he sawed off with his hunting knife. Carol offered to _cut_ the sleeves off his shirt _neatly_ for summer, and hem the material around the shoulders, but he prefers to do it this way. It's more efficient. She doesn't have time for all that cutting and hemming, and he couldn't care less what his shirt looks like.

The muscles of his arms and shoulder glisten in the August sun as he swings his crossbow onto his back. "Be good for yer mama," he tells Sweetheart and ruffles her hair.

"Hug!" Sweetheart demands, reaching her little arms up toward him where they stand on the docks. Daryl lifts her up into a great big bear hug, peppers her giggling face with kisses, and then hands her back to Carol.

Carol shifts the girl onto her hip and kisses him. "You be safe out there."

"Hell, ya already killed all the bad guys."

"Well, I don't know. A handful of the ones we left may have been bad guys. Just be careful."

He nods. "You be careful, too." He ruffles Sweetheart's hair again. "Watch out for this one. She's sneaky."

"Sneeeeeakeeee!" Sweetheart repeats with a mischievous grin.

"Are you talking about her or me?" Carol quips.

"Both m'girls." He kisses Carol on the cheek and then heads toward the ship.

As Daryl climbs up onto the _Susan Constant_ to set sail with the crew, he tries not to let his heart be cracked by Sweetheart's sudden cries of, "Daddy, no! No, Daddy go! No go, Daddy, no!"


	195. Chapter 195

The Council, absent Deputy Thomas and Captain McBride, who are on the mission to the salt ponds, begin to review the applications for the November trade trip that is still three months away. "Everyone wants to go to this fall fair," Garland says, "including my wife."

"You're not staying here?" Dr. Ahmad asks. "But Carol has applied to go. What's the point of a Lieutenant Mayor if she can't serve in your absence?"

Carol thinks Dr. Ahmad is a little bitter he didn't get the appointment. He still plans to run for mayor next year. And the next, which is when he actually hopes to _win_.

"I'll be here," Garland replies. "With VanDaryl. He'll be weaned by then, but fully potty trained. Shannon has applied to bring Gary. Just the two of them would go, if their application is approved."

Commander Witherspoon shakes his head. "I don't know about children on the ship. That doesn't sound safe. It sounds like a distraction. Didn't you say as much last time around, mayor?"

"I did. And I said as much to Shannon. She still applied."

"Well, Daryl and I are planning on bringing Sweetheart," Carol says, "if my application is approved. She's fully potty trained now, and I want everyone to meet her."

"I thought everyone important _had_ met her," Carolyn replies. "They've all been here at least once, haven't they? The leaders of the Alliance communities. Your son. Your daughter-in-law."

"There are others I'd like her to meet." The kids, for one – Judith, RJ, and Hershel. Jerry and Nabila's brood. Other old friends. And she'd like Sweetheart to have the fun of the games, not that she's quite old enough to play most of them, but she'll try. And she'll enjoy watching the horse races and other competitions. Besides, Carol doesn't want to leave her behind without either parent, not again.

"And the Council is fine with this?" Witherspoon asks. "Toddlers, on a _ship_?"

"Gary's not a toddler," Carol says. "He'll be nearly five." Well, four and seven months. "And Sweetheart will be nearly two. She's very steady on her feet. And you yourself said she seemed like a real seabird when she explored the ship. Daryl and I will watch her like hawks. I'm sure Shannon will keep a close eye on Gary."

"Sailing for two days each way?" Witherspoon asks. "After we were _attacked_ by _pirates_ last time?"

"We've done away with the pirates," Carol reasons.

Witherspoon looks with disbelief around the Council table. "You're all fine with this?"

"I'm not fine with it," Garland admits. "I tried to talk my wife out of applying to bring Gary, but, as I said…" He shrugs. "She applied."

"So we disapprove the application, then," Dr. Ahmad says matter-of-factly.

Garland leans forward slightly with one arm on the council table. "Shannon argued, and I think perhaps she's right, that there would be diplomatic value to bringing a couple of children, that it would knit our communities closer together by planting the seeds of comradery among the next generation. And Shannon will be an invaluable trade representative. You all know how convincing she can be."

"She'll probably get us a ten percent better return," Linda agrees.

"But she doesn't have to bring Gary," Carolyn suggests. "And Daryl and Carol don't have to bring Sweetheart." She smiles slightly. "You could watch them all, mayor."

"Shannon won't go without Garry," Garland insists. "He heard about the fair and has talked of nothing else sense."

Carol wonders if Shannon didn't insist on joining this trip with Gary to bolster Carol's own chances of being able to bring Sweetheart. Carol had expressed to her friend the worry that the Council would reject her application, and this might be Shannon's sneaky way of ensuring they don't. If they let one child on, why not another?

In the end, the Council of seven does reluctantly approve the application for Shannon and Gary as well as for Carol, Daryl, and Sweetheart. McBride will captain, while Witherspoon will remain behind in Jamestown, in command of the Navy in the captain's absence. Lt. Commander Lawson still refuses to join the trade trips in silent protest of the Alliance. This means Lieutenant Avalrado will have a chance to be second in command on the journey, and also have a chance to see Michonne, if she's still interested in continuing their tryst. Carol lays fifty-fifty odds on the possibility. Michonne is having a good time, but the lieutenant, on his end, seems more besotted.

Witherspoon thumbs through the applications and sets a few aside. "This is who Captain McBride told me he wanted for his crew."

The Council reviews and quickly approves the stack.

"Now let's decide the passengers and the trade team." Garland says.

Deputy Andrew's application is denied. Gunther, irritated, rips it right down the middle before throwing it in the reject pile. "Unbelievable," he mutters. "The man knows he'll have a one-month old baby, and he _still_ applies to leave Trisha alone with an _infant_ while he gallivants around Oceanside."

"I give that marriage one more year," Linda tells him.

"And how long do you give Eugene and Candy?" Gunther asks.

"For as long as Eugene has that house and that house has electricity and hot running water," Linda replies.

"A cold assessment," Gunther says. "But probably not an inaccurate one."

"She'll grow to genuinely like him," Linda replies. "I think she already does a bit. In a sort of amused, affectionate way."

"She seemed quite happy in the letter that came on the last mail boat," Gunther agrees. "Eugene's already looted her some copper stills from an abandoned farm for her moonshine. He killed seven walkers for her to get it, she said."

"It's hard for me to imagine that man slaying walkers," Dr. Ahmad admits.

"No harder than it is to imagine _you_ ," Witherspoon tells him.

"I have my duties within the gates," the doctor insists.

"Eugene used to be timid," Carol says, "but he's developed some decent fighting skills over the years. At least against walkers." She's not sure she'd rely on him to be in the front lines during a _human_ battle. But maybe she'd rely on him to trip up the enemy through some strategic plan.

"Can we get back to work, please?" Garland impatiently lifts the next application from the pile. "Joe Marlin."

"That's the new guy?" Carolyn asks. "From the cult? Kaitlyn's father?"

"Yes."

"A little soon to be sending him," the veterinarian mutters. "Why does he even want to go?"

"For the wide-open seas part of it," Linda says. "He was telling me the other night at the tavern that after being cooped up as a slave, locked in his room every night, sailing the ocean, being on an expansive beach, just seems appealing to him. He's at the tavern all the time because he can't stand being cooped up in that little dorm room. He does a lot of walking at night."

"Does Ernesto know how much time you're spending with Joe?" Gunther asks with a raised eyebrow.

Linda rolls her eyes. "Joe's just friendly."

"I hadn't noticed," Gunther murmurs. "Maybe with _you_. Otherwise, he seems to keep to himself."

Linda smiles affectionately. "You're just jealous I played chess with him last night instead of you."

"I had things to do anyway," Gunther replies.

"At least he won't be chasing any women there," Witherspoon suggests. "He won't cause any problems that way."

"Just because a man's castrated doesn't mean he isn't _capable_ ," Linda says. "He still has his…you know. And it's fully functional."

"And you know this how?" Gunther asks.

"The topic arose."

"Did it now? Was it the only thing that arose?"

"Oh, shush it! I have a boyfriend."

"And you keep refusing to move in with Ernesto no matter how many times he asks," Gunther notes.

"I like my bed in the loft," Linda reasons. "I like the smells of the Tavern."

Mayor Garland taps the table. "Can we get back to the matter at hand?"

Joe's application is not accepted. It's decided people who have been at Jamestown longer should have priority. Carolyn is sent again, both to check on any animals for trade as a veterinarian and to represent the council.

"Wait, what animals?" Gunther interrupts.

"Well, the Hilltop wants a male sheep for starters," Garland answers, "in exchange for a female goat."

"We could use another female goat," Gunther concedes.

"And Alexandria wants our second youngest pig."

"Orwell?" Gunther slides his straw hat off the table and sets it on his knee. "Does Alexandria even have anywhere to _put_ a pig? It's a suburban development, isn't it?"

"The have green spaces," Carol says. "Stables, horses, and a henhouse. A rabbit hutch."

"That little pig will yield 150 pounds of pork once it's full grown," Gunther says seriously. "We need more than three solar panels."

"They'll also give us a manual typewriter and twenty working ribbons," Garland tells him.

"A typewriter?" Gunther shakes his head. "You want to trade _pork_ for a typewriter?"

"And twenty _working_ ribbons. Eugene was able to juice them with silicone spray or something like that. I don't know how they work after all these years, but I'm assured they _do_. And it sure would make my job as mayor easier not to have to handwrite everything all the time."

"150 pounds," Gunther repeats.

"Well, you'll be there on the trade team," Garland tells him. "You can haggle for more. I'm sure Shannon will get them to throw in some Candy Shine or something, too."

"She better get more than three solar panels and a typewriter for my little Orwell, anyway," Gunther insists.

"Alexandria caught and domesticated a young wild sow," Garland tells him. "More or less domesticated it, Michonne wrote. They want Orwell so they can eventually breed her. Then they'll have more meat to trade in the future."

"Well you might have mentioned that to being with!" Gunther exclaims. "And it's a gilt, if it hasn't had piglets yet. Not a sow."

"You're like a grammar Nazi," Linda tells him. "Only with farm vocabulary."

"That's general knowledge," Gunther insists.

"Are you planning your proposal, Gunther?" Linda asks. "For the trade fair? Are you going to make a grand romantic gesture?"

"I told you. I'm not proposing again. _Dianne_ can propose if she's changed her mind."

"That's not how that works," Linda assures him.

Garland points his pencil in the tavern keeper's direction. "You're going, too, Linda, to haggle over alcohol trades with Henry and Candy. If all approve?" Seven hands go up. "So that's five council members. The captain, Carol, Carolyn, Gunther, and Linda. That's enough to sign and approve any revisions to the trade deals or to the treaty. I think we're done here for the day." He begins to gather the applications back into the file folder.

"Not quite," Gunther says. "One more order of business." He digs into the front pocket of his denim overalls and pulls out a folded sheet of paper, which he unfolds and slides across the table toward Garland. "Ernesto asked me to submit his resignation letter for him. He wants to step down from the position of farm manager. His health just isn't up to it."

"He didn't tell me he was doing that!" Linda exclaims.

"I don't think he wants you to know the shape he's in. He's not well, Linda. So maybe…more time with him and less with Joe?"

Linda shifts nervously in her chair. "His mind's as sharp as a tack," she insists. "That's what you need for managing."

"He needs to make the rounds," Gunther says. "And he needs to get in the dirt sometimes with the farmers. He knows that, and that's why he's stepping down. He wants to help you manage the tavern and liquor distribution instead. Help you do the books. Lighten your load now that you're on council."

Garland takes the letter. "Tell him his resignation is approved. If the council agrees?"

All seven members raise their hands, and Garland signs his name across the resignation to designate the Council's acceptance of it. "Congratulations, Gunther," he says, "on your promotion to the position of Farm Manager. I mean, if the council approves?" The Council does. "I suppose you'll want to appoint another assistant?"

"It would be helpful."

"Submit your nominations by this Friday," Garland tells him, "and the Council will review them at the next meeting after that."

"I don't need to think about it," Gunther says. "Raul. I want Raul. He's been farming for me ten hours a week. He's got a gift for detail and for storing up for the winter. He's a bit of ant."

"An aunt?" Linda asks.

"An ant. Like in Aesop's fable."

"Raul?" Dr. Ahmad leans forward. "But he's our apothecary!"

"That's a part-time job, and the apprentice apothecary has it all under control by now. I'm sure Raul will volunteer to check in on him once a week to answer any questions."

"He's been on construction ten hours a week," Carolyn says.

"We can take him off the construction team," Gunther replies. "The work there is drying up anyway. The grist mill is built. The dorm is built. The new barn is built. They just do repairs now."

"Conveniently for you," Dr. Ahmad says, "Inola's no longer on the council to protest. But aren't you forgetting something? Raul's at the Hilltop two weeks out of every eight now. How can we have an assistant farm manger who's not even here twelve weeks of the year?"

Raul and Enid have agreed on a routine of sorts. She'll be at Jamestown two weeks out of every eight, and he'll be at the Hilltop two weeks out of every eight, traveling on the mail boat. Enid goes by horseback to Oceanside to fetch Raul when he arrives, and she stables her horse at Oceanside for the weeks she's gone. Four weeks of every eight, they spend apart in their separate communities. Carol's not sure how long either will be satisfied with that arrangement before one or the other immigrates, but for now, it seems to work for them. They have the benefit of the fact that absence makes the heart grow fonder, and they're both so busy in their separate communities that perhaps they don't have the time to miss one another.

"When he's at the Hilltop," Gunther says, "he's sharing some of our farming methods with them and learning theirs. He's studying that _Key to Our Future_ book they have. It's an invaluable exchange, for both communities. And the twelve weeks he isn't here, I'll pick up the slack. I've practically been doing that for Ernesto already."

"I thought he was learning to be a doctor from Enid!" Dr. Ahmad exclaims. "Not a farmer!"

"He's learning a little of that, too," Gunther replies. "But we have two good doctors already. Dr. Emily's still relatively young, compared to you, and there's your apprentice. There's also Thomas, who's a fine medic. Raul's needed more on the farming side, and he's good at it. Especially at the technical aspect, and he's young and fit for the labor, too. He'd be wasted as a doctor."

"A doctor is never wasted," Dr. Ahmad insists.

"This is who I want. This is the only nomination I'm submitting."

"Let's just vote," Carol says. Like Garland, she's anxious to get out of this meeting. Her patrol shift is from two to six p.m. today, and she wants to have lunch with Sweetheart and spend some time with her before it starts. "I'm in favor of appointing Raul as assistant farm manager." She raises a hand. Gunther raises his. Hands go up all around, except for Dr. Ahmad's.

Garland sighs. "The charter requires seven votes to approve an appointment. I guess we'll have to wait for McBride and Thomas to return and see how they vote." He lowers his hand and begins stacking the manilla folders together. "You're all dismissed. Don't forget the open town hall tomorrow at noon."

Chairs shuffle and the council chambers clear out. Carol lingers to take the files from Garland and re-file them in the cabinet. As the metal cabinet door clangs shut, he's sliding his old white Stetson onto his head. "I think I owe your wife a drink," she tells him.

"Why's that?"

"She helped me get Sweetheart on that trade trip."

"Mhhm."

"You think maybe Sweetheart could play with the boys tonight, for an hour, after dinner, while I take her to the tavern?"

"You want to take my wife out?"

"I'd like to."

"I suppose she could use the break. And I suppose I could manage to coral three children for one hour." He holds up a finger. " _One_ hour."

"No more than two," Carol promises with a smile, and then heads for the daycare.

[*]

Sailors scramble on the Hampton docks to secure the ship with tight knots. Deputy Thomas and Laura lead down a horse while Santiago and Sarah cajole down a second. Daryl helps some sailors cautiously roll down the cart.

When everything is on the docks, Daryl approaches the group who will be heading to Newport News. When he's a few steps away, Santiago slaps Sarah's ass. She squeals, turns, and glares. "Do that again and you'll lose a hand."

"You love it," Santiago insists with a smirk.

Sarah shakes her head and begins latching one of the horses to the cart. Daryl joins her to help with the other. The sailors and workmen clamor down the pier and then scatter over the earth toward the evaporation ponds to check on the progress.

Captain McBride lingers. "Be safe," he tells the looting team. "And remember, the council only approved bringing your brother back." He looks directly at Laura.

"I know," she says.

"Try to be back by noon tomorrow. We're only digging one more pond, and the boys will want to get home."

Santiago nods. "Aye, aye, Captain," he says, and casually salutes.

The big red-headed captain half shakes his head before following his men.

"Who's drivin'?" Daryl asks.

"I guess Sarah and I will, since we know where we're going." Santiago climbs up onto the driver's bench of the cart. Sarah climbs up on the same side, forces him over, and takes the reins. Deputy Thomas helps Laura up onto the cart, and just when Sarah has shouted her "Hi-ya!" and it begins to jerk off, Daryl leaps on the tail end and sits facing the sea, which fades away as the cart rolls and jerks and teeters across the sandy earth to meet up with the road that will eventually take them to the old cult compound. Daryl checks his crossbow, just to be safe.


	196. Chapter 196

The men leave Sarah and Laura to guard the cart and horses in the underground garage of a building. They'll do some looting later, once they've checked on Laura's brother. "Do you have one in the chamber?" Thomas asks Laura.

"I remember what you taught me," she tells him. "I'm a pretty good shot now."

Thomas smiles indulgently.

"Better than _before_ , anyway," she concedes.

Thomas assures Daryl the roof is a good vantage point from which to view the apartment complex that once housed the cult, and it is. From there, through his binoculars, Daryl can see the black iron fence and the entrance gate – and three wooden pikes that line it. Each pike has the snapping head of a walker atop it. "Jesus," he mutters as he hands the binoculars to Santiago. "Hell they do that for? It don't keep walkers away." If anything, Daryl thinks it would draw walkers, since they have a tendency to herd up. But maybe the men uproot those pikes and take them with them like a flag pole when they go out scavenging, and it helps them blend in with the walkers, the way blood-and-gut soaked cloaks do, or the way Michonne once did with her amputated, jaw-broken walker pets.

"¡Dios Mío!" Santiago mutters, lowers the binoculars, and looks at Thomas warily. "Take a look at the head on the far left. I don't quite remember what Laura's brother looked like, but I think – "

Thomas snatches the binoculars from his hand and steps forward closer to the ledge of the building to view the scene. "Oh fuck! Oh fuck no!" He rips the binoculars from his eyes and shoves them back against Santiago's chest. Santiago grabs them.

"'S Laura's brother on that pike? Daryl asks.

"Yeah." Thomas runs a hand through his red hair restlessly. "Fuck! I don't want to have to tell her that."

"'N the other two heads?" Daryl asks.

"Two other guys we let out," Thomas replies.

"Let's get out of sight and talk," Santiago says, and they go inside the building, down one flight of stairs, and pause on a landing in the stairwell. The sun filters hazily through an uncuratined, blindness window, sending a streak of yellow-gray light across the cement stairs. They stay away from the view of the window itself. Daryl leans back against the railing of the landing, to the window's right, and Thomas sits down on the stairs, so his head is beneath the window pane and his boots rest on the landing. Santiago leans back in the corner of the walls.

"The other two heads?" Daryl repeats.

Thomas sighs. "I don't remember their names, but they were cousins, and they'd only been salves for a month. They wanted to stay behind like Laura's brother. So we gave those three men the guns and left them to let out the other men after we were gone."

"'N the other men been slaves longer?" Daryl asks.

Thomas nods. "From the start of the cult. If Zami's story is to be believed, they kept those women as sex slaves at some island camp. One night Zami and some of the other women took over. They killed some of the men and castrated and enslaved the rest."

Daryl puts a hand on the strap of his cross bow. "So them other three, the ones with their heads on pikes, even though they had the guns, them assholes got the upper hand and killed 'em when they let 'em out?"

"Seems like." Santiago rests a hand on his silver belt buckle. "But _why_ kill them?"

"If Zami was telling the truth," Thomas says, "then they're repeat rapists. Men who'll do that? They're cold blooded. They're probably cold-blooded killers, too."

"But what would they have to gain by killing those three men?" Santiago asks.

"Weren't part of their group," Daryl murmurs. "Probably just wanted their shit. Their guns. Their clothes. Hell, some assholes in the old world would kill a man over a pair of shoes."

Santiago shrugs. "Yeah. I knew some types like that in the border gangs I used to deal with. I guess the castration didn't do much to lower their testosterone."

"Surgical castration was shown to lower violent recidivism in the old world, but not to eliminate it," Thomas replies. When Daryl gives him a questioning look, he explains, "I read it somewhere once. All I'm saying is, it's not like those women didn't keep them under lock and key and armed guard."

"How many?" Daryl asks. "Men left?"

"With those three dead?" Thomas replies. "Fifteen."

"How many guns you leave 'em?"

"Just two rifles," Thomas answers. "And a hundred and eighty rounds of ammunition."

They've probably used some of that ammo by now, Daryl thinks, but two guns isn't much, at least. "'N they don't know 'bout Jamestown?"

"No, I insisted on that," Thomas replies. "They know we have a camp somewhere, and that we took Laura and Devon and Kaitlyn and Joe to it, but that's _all_ they know."

"You're not thinking about _attacking_ , are you?" Santiago asks Daryl.

"Just tryin' to decide if they're a threat to us. Jamestown is three hours up river by sailboat. Them salt ponds where we're gonna be minin' every few weeks are three hours on foot."

Thomas nods. "We should take them out."

Santiago scoffs.

"What, we should! Daryl's right. They're a _threat_."

"Didn't say they _were_ ," Daryl cautions. "Said 'em trying' to _decide_ if they are."

"We can just walk away," Santiago says. "Why wouldn't we?"

"Because they're evil!" Thomas half shouts. "They rape women, murder men, cut off heads, and stick them on pikes! We never should have let them out of their rooms in the first place. That was _Carol's_ bright idea."

Daryl shoots him an irritated look, and Thomas looks down at the landing. Dumbass ought to be a bit more grateful to Carol for saving his ass, Daryl thinks. Or for saving his dick, as the case may be.

"You agreed with that idea," Santiago reminds him. "We _all_ agreed on that plan. We thought if there was trouble, Laura's brother and those other two could handle it, since they had the guns. But I guess they couldn't. That's their mistake for choosing to stay behind. Not _ours_."

"Yeah," Thomas agrees. He glances up at Daryl. "Sorry. I just…I feel guilty. And I have to tell Laura."

"Ain't yer fault. His choice to stay, like Santiago said."

Thomas grits his teeth. "I still think we should take them out."

"It's not our job to bring down justice on anyone but our _own_ criminals," Santiago says. "And we only do that after a trial. _Deputy_."

"But we have to protect ourselves!" Thomas exclaims, his cheeks flushing with excitement and sending a pinkish-red hue across his light brown freckles. "They're on our doorstep! Just like Daryl said."

"And we'd see them coming from yards away," Santiago replies. "We have patrols, guards, gates. And way more guns than they do. They're no threat to us."

"You want me to go down there and tell Laura we're not going to do _anything_ about the men who murdered her brother? And what if they do find more guns? What if they already have? And they come at us all at once one of these days when we're working at the salt ponds? Why not take them out now, in a sneak attack? We'll have the advantage. They won't even see us coming. Carol and I took out almost all those women, just the two of us. We'd eliminate the threat, be done with it. And they deserve it for what they did to Laura's brother. For what they did to those women. That screwed-up cult didn't come out of nowhere. And Laura deserves to bury her brother." Thomas winces. "What's left of him anyway."

Santiago shakes his head. He looks at Daryl for support, but Daryl's not sure how he feels about the situation yet. He doesn't like the idea of fifteen rapist murders roaming around three hours down river from his wife and baby girl. Carol didn't see fit to wipe them out, but he and Carol don't always have to agree on everything.

"Jamestown has never been the aggressor," Santiago says firmly. "We've only ever fought defensive battles."

"When they took me," Thomas reminds him, "you went back for troops, and you came ready to kill everyone in that complex!"

"That was a _rescue mission_ ," Santiago insists. "Not that you needed much rescuing by the time we got there. But we don't just attack people and wipe them out when they haven't attacked _us_."

"They attacked Don," Thomas says. "They put his head on a pike!"

"Don isn't _us_ ," Santiago insists.

"No, but Laura _is._ And she cared about him. He was her _brother_."

"Don't think with your dick, Thomas," Santiago tells him. "Don't go in half cocked to raid a camp on behalf of some girl you're trying to get in your bed."

"Fuck you! I _genuinely_ like her. And I already got her in my bed last week!" Thomas lowers his voice. "That wasn't meant to be a brag."

Santiago sighs. "I know. Or I would have heard about it _last_ week. Listen, I'm sorry. You care about her. I get that. And that's all well and good, but you aren't thinking straight. A raid is a bad idea." He glances at Daryl. "Am I right?"

"Dunno," Daryl admits. He glances from one man from the other. "They're a potential threat. 'N we know they done some really bad shit. Ain't like we'd be killing babies here."

"Didn't you do something like this once?" Santiago asks. "The Saviors? How'd that work out for you? How many of your people ended up dead because you thought you'd just wipe out a little outpost in its sleep?"

The deputy has a point, and Daryl can see why Garland made him a deputy. Santiago's tough and he's a good shot, but he's not violent for violence's sake. "No way to know what would of happened if we hadn't, though," Daryl mutters. The raid on that outpost does seem like a bad decision in retrospect. And it was part of the chain of events that drove Carol to the Kingdom and lost her to Daryl for years. They all brought a lot of wrath down on themselves, but maybe it didn't make a difference in the long run. Negan would have extorted them soon enough, if they hadn't starved to death first. "Ain't sayin' we wouldn't scout 'em out first, to know for sure how many they got, 'n how many guns they might of found. But we know they ain't got no outposts or headquarters. We know 'zactly where they came from. They been in that complex for years, 'n before that, some island. That camp's _gone_."

"Well, we're not the Council," Santiago insists. "We can't even decide this."

"I'm on the Council," Thomas says. "And you're acting sheriff whenever Earl's not around, which he's not. And when the council's not present, the charter says any government officials who are present call the shots."

"Then we better at least consult Captain McBride," Santiago says. "He's on the council, too, now, _and_ he's the captain. Besides, if we _do_ this – and I don't think we should – we need more fighters. And we'll need more ammo, just in case."

Daryl agrees with that, and after Thomas breaks the bad news to Laura, he stays with her in the garage to comfort her while Santiago, Daryl, and Sarah get a bit closer to the complex to scout it out through binoculars. They count a total of nine men out and about at various times. Six more may be inside. They see only two rifles – the two Jamestown left behind. It seems pretty clear they haven't stockpiled more weapons. The gardens look fit to feed fewer than fifteen, but they just be poor gardeners when not under the gun of Zami.

On the way back to the salt ponds, they detour to loot a hardware store Carol found in the phone book when she was here. The team didn't have time to hit it, or the space to haul the loot, but the cart is empty now. Thomas stands guard out front with Laura, who is still too grieved over her brother to be of much help. He keeps an eye out while he keeps a comforting arm slung around her shoulders.

Daryl gets in some crossbow practice by killing three walkers inside. Sarah takes out another three with her longbow, while Santiago casually keeps his handgun holstered, unwilling to waste bullets, though he does unsheathe his knife eventually to dispense with a seventh walker.

Some of the store has been looted, maybe by Zami's cult at one time, but there's still plenty to take. They fill the cart with nails, screws, washers, bolts, rope, twine, pipes, work gloves, and other odds and ends on the wish list Inola supplied them. Daryl takes a tin watering can for Carol from the garden section, just to have something to bring her, and because she was complaining hers had developed a crack.

They're back at the salt ponds just before dinner. They load the goods onto the ship, and the debate over what to do unravels as they all share dinner in the ship's mess hall with McBride and Lt. Alvarado. "How much loot will we get?" McBride asks.

"Well, they have two guns," Thomas replies. "And those gardens. So some vegetables and whatever else they've scavenged."

"We don't kill people for loot," Santiago says.

"Of course not!" McBride agrees. "But if we're _going_ to kill, we ought to get some loot for our trouble! At least a gift for my little Oceanside mermaid."

Daryl eyes him skeptically. "Ya call Cyndie that to 'er face?"

"No. I only made that mistake once." An affectionate smile creeps across the captain's fair face.

Daryl pushes his empty camp plate aside on the rotting picnic table where they sit to eat. "Are we doin' this or ain't we?"

McBride guzzles the last of his water and lowers his pewter cup to the table. "Lieutenant?" he asks Alvarado. "Your opinion? You're a government official too."

"They're rapists and murderers, and we're going to have to be back here every few weeks for mining, just ten miles from their doorstep. I think it would be a relief if we knew they weren't there."

"You'll volunteer for the raiding party then?" McBride asks.

"Yes, sir."

"All in favor?" McBride asks. Thomas raises his hand, and so does Lt. Alvarado. "Santiago? Is that a nay?"

"It's a nay. I'm not in favor of this raid, but it happens, I'll come with you. I'll fight."

"And you, Daryl?" McBride asks.

"I ain't a government 'ficcial." He doesn't want this decision to be in his hands. "I don't get no vote on this."

"I won't do this if the hero of the mutiny of 7 NE isn't on my side," McBride insists.

"I'll join the raid, if that's what yer askin'," Daryl says. "But I ain't decidin' on it."

McBride nods. "You don't have to. It's three officials against one. We raid tonight. Let's round up a few more volunteers."

Sarah volunteers to join them. Laura says she would, if she were a better shot and a better soldier, but she's afraid Thomas will just be distracted trying to protect her. Junior Lieutenant Harry Merriweather volunteers, but McBride tells him no, not with a pregnant wife back home and a baby due in December, he won't be on this dangerous mission. "Hold down the ship for me while I'm gone," McBride tells the young man. Two other sailors step up to volunteer, however, and the team of eight sets out on foot, locked and loaded, just as the sun begins to set.


	197. Chapter 197

Carol takes a slow sip of Madam Linda's special appletini and lets the sweet sensation linger on her tongue. "God, that's good."

"I try my best," Linda replies, drops some ammo into the cash box, and makes her way to the other end of the bar to talk to Joe.

"I think that newcomer has a little crush on Linda," Shannon says.

"He's not exactly a newcomer anymore, is he?" Carol asks. "The cult refugees are all citizens now."

"True enough." Shannon sips her glass of wine. It's the last glass from one of the bottles they got in trade from Oceanside. "I'm so glad you suggested this. I sure needed a break. Garland's been grumpy ever since I applied to take Gary on that trade trip. He's really been harshing my mellow."

Carol laughs. "He seemed rather resigned to the fact at the council meeting yesterday."

"Oh, he'll get over it. Especially after a good blow job. And after a couple of these…" Shannon swirls her wine.

Carol raises her martini glass and they toast. She switches to coffee after the first drink, but Shannon opts for the Jamestown moonshine. When they get back to the Barron cabin later, Shannon's a little tipsy and affectionate. The boys are already asleep in their bedroom, and Sweetheart is passed out on the deerskin rug. Carol scoops up her baby girl while Shannon whispers something in Garland's ear, thanks the mayor for watching her, and takes her home to her bed.

[*]

The group of eight makes it way on foot to the apartment complex. They stay low and creep behind abandoned cars, buildings, and finally bushes, gesturing to one another with hand signals as they spy out the grounds. There's a single armed guard by the gate and no sign of anyone else awake. The guard walks with a rifle on his shoulder as he smokes a hand-rolled cigarette. The red-orange tip glows in the shadowy black that surrounds him, and the smoke rises and curls, gray in the moonlight.

Captain McBride nods to Sarah, who loads her longbow and creeps from behind one bush to another. Daryl, who lies supine and peers around the bush that's blocking him, watches the guard. When the man turns and begins to stroll away from them, he whistles to Sarah, who leaps up from behind the bush, aims, and fires. The arrow soars through a space between the iron bars of the fence, glides smoothly across the parking lot, and penetrates all the way through the guard's neck. He drops. His cigarette glows on the parking lot pavement, flashes a fine mist of orange, and then goes out.

The group scurries to scale the iron fence. Santiago's the best climber, and he's on the ground on the other side first, ready to help Sarah over. Soon enough, they've all surrounded the fallen body. Captain McBride scoops up the guard's discarded rifle from the parking lot pavement while Sarah tries to reclaim her arrow, but it snaps in half as she yanks it from the man's neck. She steps back and tosses the broken shaft aside with frustration.

Lieutenant Alvarado sticks a knife through the guard's forehead so he won't reanimate, and then Thomas strips the blood-splattered binoculars off his neck and puts them in his knapsack. Santiago unclips a knife, which he then clips to his own belt, while Daryl rifles through the guard's pockets. He finds three hand-rolled cigarettes, which he drops quickly into the pockets of his cargo pants. They might be useful for trade.

"Why do _you_ get those?" one of the two sailors who volunteered for the raid asks. His name is Terry, or maybe Cary – Daryl doesn't exactly remember.

"'Cause I found 'em," Daryl mutters.

"Is this one of the guns you left behind?" McBride asks Santiago, extending the deputy's direction.

Santiago takes it and looks it over. "I don't remember. Thomas?"

Thomas shakes his head. "Could be. Probably. I don't remember what two rifles we left. We took a lot of guns."

"Let's hope it is," McBride says as he takes the rifle back from Santiago and shoulders it. "I'd like to think they haven't found more guns."

"What's next, Captain?" the second sailor asks.

"We raid the building on the left first," McBride says in a low hush. "Two groups, start at each end. Get them in their sleep. Whistle low when you round a corner, so we don't shoot each other." He nods to Daryl. "Go ahead and pick your men. But Lieutenant Alvarado's with me."

Daryl guesses that means he's in charge of one of the groups. "Sarah 'n Santiago."

"I'll give you Merry, too," McBride insists. "Then it's four and four."

Merry. No wonder Daryl couldn't remember that. What the hell kind of name is Merry? What is he, one of the seven dwarfs? Daryl doesn't particularly _want_ Merry, but he agrees to take the sailor, who looks like he can't be much more than twenty-five.

McBride swings his knapsack off his back and unzips it. "You'll be needing these." He hands out two headlamps to Daryl's team. Santiago takes one, lifts his old, faded brown Border Patrol cowboy hat, and slips the band around his forehead before settling the hat back on. Sarah takes the second headlamp. "Don't turn them on until you're sweeping inside," McBride cautions. "They're solar powered, but the charge doesn't last long. That and we don't want to draw attention to ourselves before we have to." He hands one to Alvarado and then puts one on his own head. "Good luck, gentlemen." He nods apologetically to Sarah. "And lady."

Daryl leads his group to the west entrance. He tries the doorknob, expecting to find it locked, but it turns. He nods to Sarah and Santiago, who reach up and click on their headlights. They look like miners getting ready to go down into the shaft. Sarah has shouldered her longbow – it's useless for close quarters – and draws her handgun. Santiago readies his rifle, and Merry takes the safety off his. Daryl cocks his crossbow and returns his hand to the knob. He counts down, quietly, and flings open the door on one.

Sarah and Santiago spill inside, lighting up the hallways in all directions. "Clear!" hisses one. "Clear!" hissed the other.

Daryl and Merry spill in behind them. They're but a few steps in when Sarah gags, closes her mouth, splutters and swallows. The others do the same. They only make it to the first apartment door before they're all pinching their noses and trying not to vomit. "Retreat!" Santiago cries, and they turn tail and run out the door, where they gasp for fresh air.

"Just like them damn pirates," Daryl mutters. The group that attacked the ship on the way to the first trade trip used one of their cabins as a shithouse, too.

"Why not just use the outhouses?" Merry asks. "They've got _two_."

Sarah shrugs. "Too lazy to maintain them, maybe. Figured they'd fill every toilet in that building first. I found worse when I used to clean up after hoarders."

"That's what you did in the old world?" Merry asks skeptically.

"It pays well. But I had the benefit of a Hazmat suit then. I'm not taking another step in there without a mask."

"Don't need to," Daryl says. "Ain't no way anyone's livin' in there."

They creep around to the front of the apartment building, where they meet up with McBride, Thomas, Alvarado, and the other sailor. "Clearly they aren't sleeping there," McBride says. "Onto the next building."

Daryl leads his group to the west end, but this time the door is locked. "Ya got that silencer," he tells Santiago, "shoot it off."

As Santiago is stepping back to do the deed, Merry says, "It's not that easy to shoot off a lock. It'll take a few bullets."

"Ain't no other way in," Daryl says, "'cept smashin' a winduh, and that'd be louder. Then we'd have to crawl through. Be vulnerable. Exposed."

"I can pick it." Merry urges Santiago aside and pulls something from his pocket. Daryl grows impatient after about ninety seconds of picking and is about to tell him to stand back so Santiago can shoot through when there's a click, and the knob turns. Maybe it's not such a bad thing to have Merry on his team after all, Daryl thinks, as long as he doesn't mention the cigarettes again.

Daryl nods to Merry, who swings open the door. The team bursts in, sweeping in all directions. They make their way down the hallway, opening doors two by two, Daryl with Merry, and Sarah with Santiago.

"Empty," Santiago whispers when he returns to the hallway.

"Empty," Daryl agrees.

The next two doors are empty as well – almost. "Clothes in there," Daryl says.

"The bed looks recently sleeped in," Sarah says. "In that one. And there's a mostly empty bottle of vodka."

The next two apartments reveal similar, lived-in scenes.

"They're awake," Merry whispers. "But not here?"

"Careful," Daryl cautions.

They continue creeping and clearing rooms. They find every apartment empty, some lived in, some not. As they round a corner, Daryl whistles to alert McBride that it's only them, and the two groups meet in the open foyer. "Anythin'?" Daryl asks.

"The rooms were all empty," the lieutenant answers, "but a couple looked lived in."

"Same for us," Santiago says.

Captain McBride sighs. "Where the hell _are_ they? They weren't outside. We swept the whole perimeter. It was just the one guard."

"There's the clubhouse," Thomas says. "Where the cult had its banquets."

The two teams leave the apartment building and enter the clubhouse from two different directions, but they find it empty except for the tables and chairs. The bulletin board that was once peppered with feminist slogans has been slashed to shreds at knife point.

"Hey, Merry," Daryl says. "Can ya pick this?" There's a large padlock around both knobs of both doors of the storage closet in the banquet hall.

Merry squats down, puts his ear to the combination lock, and turns it this way and that as he listens. Finally, he yanks down, and the lock slides free.

"What ya do in the old world?" Daryl asks him. "Rob banks?"

"Expensive bicycles, mostly. And sheds. For the lawn equipment."

"Make a good livin'?"

"The state gave me free room and board and medical care after a while, as a reward for my talents."

Daryl smirks. "Were ya in when it started?"

Merry nods. "Just in juvie. I was fifteen back then. The guards let us out though, those of us who hadn't turned." He nods at the closet door. "Ready?"

Daryl levels his bow, just in case. Merry swings the closet door open. From behind them, McBride lets out a whoooooo-wheeeee whistle. The rest of the team surrounds them and peers inside.

The closet is full of fresh loot – ammunition, alcohol, batteries, instant coffee, powdered milk (Daryl wouldn't trust that at this point; no wonder they had the shits), bags of rice, sugar, and guns. At least six guns.

Santiago weaves between supplies to investigate. "They've done well for themselves since we left. Wonder where they found all this?"

"Wonder where they _are_ ," McBride says. "That's the more serious question right now."

"And why didn't they bring their guns with them?" Thomas asks.

"Oh _shit_." Santiago has found a clipboard and is reading the top page of papers on it. As he flips the page over, a pencil, tied by a string, falls off the clipboard and swings lazily in the hazy glow of his headlamp. "Because these are the guns leftover _after_ they checked fifteen rifles and six handguns _out_ of their armory."

"Hell's bells!" McBride swirls with alarm, looking left and then right. "They're well-armed then. Wherever they are."

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Deputy Thomas says.

McBride clears his throat.

"Sorry," Thomas apologizes.

"Where do you suppose they are?" Lieutenant Alvarado asks. "They weren't in either building. They aren't here. We scoured the whole perimeter before we scaled the fence. They weren't out _there_."

"They left one man," McBride says, "to guard the whole place, and left with their guns. Why?"

Santiago drops the clipboard. It clatters against the cans of coffee. The light from his headlamp blinds Daryl for a moment as he turns toward them. Daryl shields his eyes with a hand. "They must have seen our ship," Santiago says.

"How?" Sarah asks. "We didn't sail past their docks. We came around the –"

"- That guard had binoculars," McBride interrupts, "and from the roof of this apartment complex, you could see a ship sailing on the horizon up to twelve miles away. The only other nearby docks are in Hampton. If they saw us, they know where we were headed."

"They've gone marching in the ship's direction." Thomas rocks back on his heels and runs a hand nervously over his mouth.

"To the salt ponds," Santiago agrees with a hiss. "They've headed out to raid _us_ , just like we were about to _foolishly_ raid _them_!"

"Who's in charge back at the ponds?" Daryl asks.

"Junior Lieutenant Harry Merriweather," answers McBride, looking sick to his stomach. That's the young junior lieutenant he wouldn't allow to join them on this risky mission, because of his pregnant wife back home. "Shite!"

"We better hurry back," Merry says. "We better pound foot. And maybe stop by that bicycle shop we passed half a mile ago to fetch a faster ride."

Leaving the supply closet open, and the loot behind, the team tears toward the clubhouse door.


	198. Chapter 198

The pain and fear and exhaustion that comes with fighting a battle is not nearly as bad as the sheer powerlessness of arriving in its aftermath. Daryl would rather be staring down the barrel of a rifle than walking through the carnage he was not here to prevent. The bicycle he rode with pounding heart toward the sound of gunfire now lies abandoned a few yards from the docked _Susan Constant_. Torches have already been lit to illuminate the fallen and wounded men on the pier and ship.

Thomas leaps from the dirt bike he was riding, and it clatters onto the wooden planks of the dock. Abruptly falling into his role as a field medic, he unzips his backpack, pulls out his emergency kit, and joins the nurse who is already at work. An ensign jogs down the dock to greet the stunned and arriving Captain McBride.

"How many dead?" McBride asks hollowly while Daryl listens.

The ensign nods to the James River. That father-to-be, Junior Lieutenant Harry Merriweather, lies face down in the black water. His body, riddled with bullet holes, floats slowly south. The sailors have dropped a rowboat. "Get him," the captain tells Lieutenant Alvarado and Merry, who have just arrived on their bicycles. The two men nod and board the dropped rowboat. "Who else?" McBride asks.

"Several wounded," the ensign replies, "but only one other dead."

When a howl goes up from Thomas on the deck of the _Susan Constant_ , Daryl can guess who the second victim is.

"Laura?" McBride asks.

The ensign nods. "They tried to take her. I think they planned to kill all the men and take the women. Take our ship and supplies. It was so dark. It was so sudden."

"Did ya get 'em all?" Daryl asks. "Any escape?"

"We didn't _see_ any escape," the ensign replies. "We've counted fourteen raiders dead."

Daryl glances at McBride, who nods. There were eighteen men left behind at those apartments. Three ended up with their heads on pikes. The one who was left to guard the place Sarah killed. That leaves fourteen.

McBride closes his eyes and breathes in. When he opens them, he says, "I made Harry stay. I thought the mission was too risky for an expectant father. Kelly will be a widow, and that child will be fatherless because of me."

Daryl wants to tell the captain he can't do that shit. That there's no point in second guessing himself. That McBride clearly had the young man's interests at heart. But he knows it would be useless to say anything. He knows the way a man's conscience devours itself when the people he cares about dies. So instead he just walks on, boards the ship, and tries to help treat the wounded. He's no trained medic, but he's seen enough battles and been in enough binds to pick up a thing or two along the way.

[*]

There's something in her bed. Carol instinctively reaches for the knife she isn't wearing and groggily realizes it's just Sweetheart. She sighs. "Hey, Sweeite. What's wrong?"

"Dada?"

"Dada's on a trip. He'll be home tomorrow night. Remember?"

"No Dada?"

"No, not tonight, but he'll be back."

Sweetheart squirrels under the blanket and Carol turns on her side and drapes an arm around her. It's not long before the little girl is back to sleep, her chest rising and falling rhythmically, but Carol feels uneasy. The last trip to the salt ponds was an unexpected and dangerous adventure, after all. It's a long while before she, too, drifts back to sleep.

[*]

The wounded are patched. So are the bullet holes in the ship. Harry and Laura's bodies are tightly wrapped in burlap and put deep in the hold. They'll be brought home for burial in the Jamestown cemetery that has seen so few unnatural deaths. Sailors weave through the raiders dead bodies, collecting guns, ammo, and knives.

Sarah and Santiago go to one of the ship's cabins to sleep. Thomas paces the deck, blaming himself for Laura's death, because he insisted on the raid, because he wasn't here to protect her.

McBride leans over the ship's rail next to Daryl, who is staring down at the blue-black water that gently slaps the side of the docked ship. The captain runs a hand through his red hair. "I don't know how I'm going to tell Kelly. And Harry's mother. She's half senile, but…she'll understand _this_." He stands straight. "You better get some sleep. I'm sending you and Santiago and Sarah early in the morning with the cart and horses back to the apartments to pack up that loot."

"I'll come too," Thomas says as he stops abruptly in his pacing behind them. He steps toward the ship's rail. "I need to bury Laura's brother's head. She would have wanted me to."

McBride nods. "I'll give Harry's widow and mother my portion of the finder's fee. Will you two consider doing the same?"

"'Course," Daryl murmurs.

"It's the least I can do." Thomas grits his teeth. "I insisted on the raid. If we hadn't – "

"-If we hadn't," Daryl interrupts. "They still woulda come here."

"But Laura wouldn't be dead. I'd have – "

"- Can't know what would of happened," Daryl insists, which is true, though he does think fewer would have been wounded had he been here.

"I'll talk to Lieutenant Alvarado," McBride says, "and Merry and George and see if they'll give up their finder's fees, too. Will you talk to Santiago and Sarah, Thomas?"

"Yeah," Thomas mutters. "Sure." His blue eyes glisten with the tears he's been holding back for the past two hours.

"With all those finder's fees, all that ammo," McBride continues, "Kelly will be able to afford to take some time off work to grieve and to be with the baby when it comes. She'll be able to support Harry's child and his mother for a time. Until she's ready to work again."

"'S the right thing," Daryl agrees.

"Now get some sleep, gentlemen," the captain tells them. "You've got a lot of loading to do tomorrow."

[*]

The next morning, when they return to the apartment complex, Thomas buries the heads while Santiago, Daryl, and Sarah search the apartment complex thoroughly. They clear the men's bedrooms of sturdy work boots, alcohol, and ammo. They pluck the vegetable garden clean. "I think they did a better job maintaining this when they had slave masters," Santiago says. Still, there are enough fresh vegetables to serve a hundred people.

"But they did a better job of scavenging without them," Sarah notes.

By the time they leave, the cart is overflowing, and there's even loot on the bench beside Sarah and the floor around her feet as she drives the horses, which pull the heavy cart slowly. Thomas walks ahead of the horses, his rifle in hand. Their packs stuffed full, Daryl and Santiago walk behind the cart to make sure nothing falls out. They pass an open bottle of whiskey between themselves as they walk, because, as Daryl always says, "What don't come back, don't come back."


	199. Chapter 199

Cheering goes up from the docks of Jamestown when the _Susan Constant_ arrives that evening, because what the citizens who linger by the river see unloaded first is the loot – not the bodies that lay deeper in the hold. Rejoicing soon turns to mourning.

Thomas walks ahead of Harry's body to greet the sailor's widow on the docks, where she's been waiting expectantly for his return ever since the watchman in the lighthouse signaled the ship's arrival with flashes of light through the town. It's Thomas who tells her, because it's Thomas who feels guilty for insisting on the raid, for taking eight of their best fighters from the salt ponds and leaving the rest vulnerable. Kelly wails and then pounds her fist against the deputy's chest in grief and rage, and Thomas takes the blows until she stands back and puts a hand on the belly that just began to show two weeks ago.

Carol embraces her tired husband and kisses his cheek, grateful he's alive, but not wanting to show her joy too obviously in the presence of the widow. Sweetheart, who is on her hip, is unaware of the deaths and unperturbed by social conventions, and she claps with joy and cries out, "Dada! Yay! Yay, Dada!" Daryl quiets her by plucking her from Carol's arms and giving her the embrace she desires. She snuggles sleepily against his chest, and he takes Carol's hand and walks home with her while a few men tend to the bodies and others to the loot.

The graves are dug by night, the funeral held by sunrise, and the bodies finally covered with dirt beneath a fine mist of late morning rain. Wooden crosses are planted in the yielding earth, and mounds of mud patted around their bases to hold them tight.

There are murmurs of complaint – Carol, Thomas, Santiago, and Alvarado should have decided to kill all those men the _first_ time, some people say, and then Harry and Laura never would have died. Thomas shouldn't have insisted on the raid, others say, and Captain McBride never should have agreed to it. He's the captain! Why did he let himself be led by a mere deputy and councilman?

"Armchair quarterbacks," Daryl mutters to Carol when she comes home the next evening from her patrol rounds, annoyed by the accusatory grumbling. He sets a bowl of stew on the table before her. He's already fed Sweetheart, and the little girl is now on her knees before Stinky's tank, chattering to the lizard.

Carol slides warily into her seat and picks up the spoon. "Thanks for cooking."

"Mhmh. Ain't as good as you make it."

"More meat though, I see." She smiles.

"Yeah…uh…now we're gonna be out for the week by Friday. Guess I didn't judge it good."

"We'll have beans on Saturday. Or you can catch us some squirrels. Maybe that one that's been trying to claw his way through the roof?"

"Crafty bastard," Daryl says as he sits down across from her. "Keeps gettin' way from me."

Sweetheart toddles over and hugs her returning mother. "Stinky hungwy!"

"Stinky ate," Daryl insists.

"Stinky hungwy, Dada. Yum, yum bug."

"She learn to talk more while I's gone?" he asks Carol.

"I think so. Sophia never talked like this at twenty months. She'll be talking circles around us in a year."

Sweetheart, giving up hope of getting her father to feed Stinky more bugs, toddles over to play with Dog.

"Rumor is that Thomas wanted the raid," Carol says, "but you and Santiago resisted the idea until the last minute."

"Wasn't like that 'zactly."

"What was it like? You haven't talked about it since you got home."

"If I'd wanted to, would of."

Carol shrugs. "Fine then." She pulls her glass of water to herself and takes a sip. She sets it down. "I just think if you did, you might not seem so tightly wound."

Daryl sighs. "Thomas wanted the raid. Santiago didn't. Me?" He shrugs. "Didn't resist it. Didn't encourage it neither. But I went with 'em when the time came."

"But what did you think of it?"

"Thought those men were rapist and murderers. Thought I don't want 'em within a hundred miles of my girls."

Carol stirs the soup in her bowl and watches the lightly colored liquid ripple. "Do you think I should have finished them all off? Do you think I was wrong not to?"

"Can't do that, Carol. Stop that shit right now."

Carol lets go of her spoon and it clinks against the side of the bowl. She leans back against her chair and crosses her arms over her chest. "Harry and Laura and her brother and those other two men would be alive if I had."

"Stop that shit right now," Daryl repeats.

"Shit!" Sweetheart cries from the bearskin rug where she sits petting Dog.

Carol and Daryl both chuckle. "Oh God," Carol says. "I hope she doesn't do that in daycare."

That night they talk a little more in bed, after Sweetheart is asleep. Then they make love slowly – the welcome home they didn't have last night, _couldn't_ have last night, in the shadow of the town's grief.

[*]

Within a week, the grumbling and second guessing of the citizens has subsided. Life is back to normal, except for the widow Kelly and for Harry's elderly mother, and except for Thomas, who has to stare every night at the wall he built between his room and Laura's in the barracks. The Council says to leave the furniture for now. Jamestown will grow. The room will be inhabited eventually.

But Thomas packs up Laura's personal things – her clothes and books and the canned and jarred food she hadn't gotten around to - and returns them to the pantry and storage room for future redistribution. He holds back her pocket knife, a token of the woman, he thought, perhaps, he might one day persuade to be his wife.

[*]

In September, red and orange colors begin to burst from the forests behind Jamestown. The community grows yet again – another boy is born, this time to Trisha and Deputy Andrew. They name him John, after the first leader of the post-apocalyptic Jamestown colony. He's born slightly premature, but he fights for life and holds on. Trisha begins her maternity leave, with Andrew seeking extra work hours to provide, so Carol lets him have four of her patrol hours. As lieutenant mayor, she's busy enough.

A woman named Rebecca takes over Trisha waitressing job at the tavern. The service slows down a bit, with just Rebecca and the teenage apprentice waiter Samuel. Neither is very experienced, or nearly as chatty as Trisha or Candy for that matter, and the place seems a little less friendly, but still a suitable haunt for the lonely, tired, and thirsty.

But as well as a life, September also heralds a death, this time from natural causes. The retired farm manager Ernesto dies of a sudden heart attack – or perhaps not so sudden. It may not have been his first, as Linda discovers when she finds a notebook among his things. He's been privately and quietly tracking his chest pains, without informing anyone, not even Dr. Ahmad. There isn't much to be done for heart disease with the limited resources of these apocalyptic times, and the man must have decided it was his time.

He's left a will on file with the Jamestown courthouse. The judge unseals it. Ernesto has left all his remaining food for re-distribution to the orphans, his private horse to Gunther, and his ammo, tobacco, cabin, and all its furnishings to Linda. Linda offers the cabin to Gunther. "I prefer to live in the tavern," she tells him. "And now that Candy is gone, I have it all to myself. I like being nearer work. No walking home at night. And I don't want to sleep in Ernesto's cabin. His ghost will haunt me."

"Are you sure?" Gunther asks. "It's a homey cabin. And you can't climb that ladder to the loft forever."

"Well, when I can't climb the ladder, I can't walk all the way to the tavern either. I'll just move into the tavern's storage room then. Besides, old friend, you'll need something bigger than a single room one day, if you ever want to persuade Dianne to marry you and move _here_."

Gunther accepts the generous offer and moves his things out of the dormitory. He helps Linda take a few pieces of furniture from Ernesto's old cabin to the loft - an end table, an armchair, and a bookcase. She makes a sitting room of Candy's old room.

Linda mourns her deceased beau, but not for long. By October, she's dating the cult refugee Joe.

"And that's not the _only_ juicy gossip I have," Shannon tells Carol at the Barron dinner table while the children play in the living room.

Garland rolls his eyes. "You live to gossip, my love."

"Well, a girl needs some entertainment when her husband never takes her to the movies."

Daryl chuckles and cuts into his venison steak. The Barrons are hosts today, but the Dixons supplied the meat – Daryl did some overtime hunting.

"I took you to the movies just last week," Garland mutters.

"To see Die Hard 2," Shannon insists. "It's not like you took me to a _romance_."

"That's what was playing. I don't choose the movies. Take that up with the entertainment director."

"I should have that job!" Shannon insists.

"You really should," Carol agrees.

"Why am I assigned to gardening when I could be the town's entertainment director!"

"Because, darling," Garland tells her, "Robert is missing a leg, and he needs a job that doesn't involve kneeling in the dirt or patrolling the town or climbing ladders. And he used to be a high school drama teacher. That's the extent of his skill set."

Shannon sighs. "Well, I need to have a word with him about the lack of variety in his movie selections lately. What's he going to choose for the winter musical? Seven Samurai?"

"I don't think anyone's ever written a musical version of Seven Samurai," Carol says with a smile.

" _Robert_ would." Shannon turns her attention to Gary for a moment and tells him to stop trying to take a matchbox car from his brother.

"I had it first!"

"Well, VanDaryl has it now. He's your baby brother. Let him have it."

Gary rolls his eyes, sighs, and heads to the basket on the bookshelf to get another car. VanDaryl smiles sneakily and hands the car he took from Gary to Sweetheart. "Weetie!" he says as he offers the gift.

Sweetheart takes the car, but instead of playing with it – or, thankfully, shoving it in her mouth – she toddles over to the bookcase and hands it to Gary. "Hey, thanks, Sweetie," Gary says, and VanDaryl frowns to see his stolen gift returned to its rightful owner.

"It's going to be _My Fair Lady_ ," Garland says. "The audition announcements went up today."

"Oh, I love that!" Shannon insists. "I'm trying out."

"When would you have the time to rehearse?" Garland asks.

"I'll make the time. I can put the boys in daycare during rehearsal."

"Are you going to try out?" Garland asks Daryl with a deadpan, serious look. Daryl stops chewing, and Garland laughs. "God what I wouldn't pay to see you in a musical." He turns his head toward the living room. "Boys! Wouldn't you love to see your godfather in a musical?"

Gary looks up from the car he's begun to run along the coffee table and lets out a _Bwahhhaaaahaaaa!_ of a laugh.

"I think you'd make a fine Professor Henry Higgins," Garland says.

"Stahp," Daryl insists.

Carol spares Daryl by changing the subject. "What was your other gossip, Shannon?"

"Oh. You know Kaitlyn, that cult refugee? Joe's daughter?" Carol nods. "Well, there's been a little trouble in the bedroom with her boyfriend on account of his…" Shannon looks down in her lap. "You know. Not much of a libido. They broke up."

"That's a shame," Carol says. She feels sorry for the castrated young man.

"She's dating one of the sailors now. Merry."

"Hell kind of name is Merry?" Daryl asks.

"I think it's a nickname," Garland says, "though I never asked."

"Oh!" Shannon exclaims. "And Barry's girl Rachel got herself knocked up by that Jackson boy."

"That I knew," Carol says. "They applied for Laura's old room in the barracks. And now Thomas wants to move back to the apartment complex so he doesn't have to listen to them going at it. So the Council granted him Gunther's old room."

"Well Garland didn't tell me all that!" Shannon slaps his knee under the table. "Why not, baby?"

"I didn't realize it was noteworthy."

"You know what _is_ noteworthy, though?" Shannon asks as she returns her hand to her fork. "All the time Thomas has been spending with Harry's widow."

"Feels guilty," Daryl mutters.

"At first, that's why he was checking up on her," Shannon says. "But I don't think that's why he's been checking up on her lately. If you know what I mean."

"What? Kelly's in her twenties," Garland says.

"And Thomas is in his thirties. He's not as old as you, baby."

"You say that like I'm ancient."

Shannon smiles affectionately. "I've always liked older men. Wait till you get a little gray in your beard like Daryl. It'll be sexy."

Garland frowns skeptically. "I've already found a little gray around my temples, thank you very much."

Sweetheart stumble runs and plants herself against Daryl's leg. "Pway! Dada Pway!"

Daryl wipes his mouth with a cloth napkin and gets up to join the kids in the living room. "Ten minutes," he tells her. "'N them 'm playin' with Uncle Garland."

"Do Carol and I get to watch?" Shannon asks.

Daryl flushes red. "Meant poker."

The men go to the tavern for their now monthly poker game with Dante, Santiago, Gunther, and Mitch, and Daryl comes home to the Dixon cabin after Sweetheart is in bed. His pockets are full with two more rounds of ammo than when he left, his head is ever so slightly buzzed, he's clutching a disarrayed bouquet of wild autumn-blooming asters he plucked from the field behind the tavern, and he's happy and horny. Luckily for him, Carol's been up reading a trashy serial romance novel to unwind, _Denim Dreams_ #42, and she's in the mood. It's a good night, a fun night, and the morning comes to soon. When the next quiet evening rolls around, Carol puts the finishing touches on Sweetheart's Little Bo Beep costume for Halloween.


	200. Chapter 200

"Sure ya don't want to take 'er this year?" Daryl asks as Carol ties the bow of the Little Bo Peep bonnet around Sweetheart's chin.

"Shannon's bringing wine, and I like seeing all the costumes when I hand out the treats."

"Where'd she get wine?" The tavern won't sell an entire bottle to take home – not of wine.

Carol straightens the little girl's frilly bonnet and smooths out a wrinkle in her dress. "She traded Kelly for it."

"Ah." They did loot several bottles of wine from the storage closet at that apartment complex. The finder's fees were all donated to the Harry's widow. Kelly's still working for now – the baby's not due until December – but she's been trading some of the loot to stock up on jarred food.

There's a knock at the door. Carol grabs the bowl of treats – Daryl went looting for little toys again, but she unfortunately didn't have enough sugar to make rock candy this time. It's just Garland and Shannon, holding VanDaryl in her arms. The eighteen-month-old is wearing a wooly sheep's costume, made with cotton balls and felt, as a companion to Sweetheart's Little Bo Beep.

"Where's Gary?" Carol asks as she steps back to let them inside.

"He wanted to go with a friend this year," Shannon says.

Garland frowns as he closes the door behind himself. "He's getting too cool for his old man."

"He's not even five!" Carol exclaims.

"Well, they have adult supervision," Shannon says. "Albert's mother."

"I assumed," Carol assures her. "I just mean he's too young to be too cool for his father."

"You just wait and see," Garland warns her.

Carol looks down at Sweetheart. "You'll never be too cool for your mother, will you?"

Sweetheart cranes her neck back and smiles up at her. Then she toddles forward to hug VanDaryl as Shannon sets the little boy on his feet. One of the cotton balls falls off his costume.

"Uh-oh!" Sweetheart says as she steps back, picks it up, and hands it to him. VanDaryl puts it straight in his mouth, and Garland sighs and fishes the now wet blob out.

"Adorable costume," Carol tells Shannon. "You did a great job."

"What makes you think _I_ didn't make it?" the mayor quips. He holds up the dripping cotton ball. "Trash?"

Carol points to the trashcan under the kitchen counter.

[*]

The jagged smile of a jack o' lantern glows on the rough doormat outside the cabin that used to belong to the now deceased Ernesto. Daryl lifts Sweetheart up by her hips, and she grasps the metal door knocker and pounds it. As he settles Sweetheart back down on her feet, VanDaryl leans back against his father's legs. Gunther swings open the door.

"Twi twee!" Sweetheart shouts, while VanDaryl merely thrusts out his plastic pumpkin with a silent smile. It's their tenth cabin, the tenth that had a paper pumpkin out front to indicate they welcome trick or treaters, anyway. The kids know the routine.

"I don't have anything for your buckets," Gunther says, "but I have fresh apple slices inside for the kids. And I've got a treat for the fathers, too."

Garland and Daryl glance curiously at each other before following Gunther inside.

"Nice place," Garland tells him, "but you could use some more furniture."

"Linda took most of it for the loft, and I left mine in the dorm for the next roomer. But I have all I need for a bachelor. I suppose if Dianne ever deigns to move in with me, I'll pay Dante to build more. Or I'll pay Daryl to loot some for me." Gunther shoots a questioning look at Daryl.

"Sure." Daryl's always happy to earn some more tobacco or ammo for trade.

A dog looks up from the handwoven rug before the rustic brick fireplace and growls. It's clear the rug was made by Inola. They have one somewhat like it in Sweetheart's room. "Quiet, Ajax!" Gunther orders. "They're friends." The farmer looks back at the men. "He's a good herd dog, but sometimes he gets grumpy around strangers." Daryl didn't realize Gunther had a dog. He knew he had working dogs, of course, but he thought they all slept in the barns.

The dog licks its chops and settles its head on its feet again.

"Are you proposing to Dianne again at the trade fair?" Garland asks as they follow Gunther to the kitchenette, which has no dining table. There are two lonely bar stools at the counter, which still has the evening's uncleared dinner plate and cup.

"Why does everyone keep asking me that? No, _she_ can propose this time," Gunther insists. He opens a small plastic cooler and hands each of the men an apple slice for the kids.

"Good luck with that." Garland pinches off a small piece of apple and feeds it to VanDaryl off his fingertip.

Daryl hands Sweetheart the entire slice. It's thin and soft enough, and she's pretty good about not choking herself these days. She hums while she eats it. "'N where's our treat?" Daryl asks.

Gunther walks around to the other side of the counter, which must have shelves beneath it, and pulls out two shot glasses. Next there emerges a mason jar of clear liquid.

Garland looks at him warily. "I thought you quit drinking."

"I did. I got this for the trick or treaters." He unscrews the metal circular cap and pours a little in each shot glass.

Daryl plucks up his shot glass.

"Happy Halloween," Garland says as he raises his glass. Daryl toasts him, and they both shoot back the moonshine.

Garland hisses, and Daryl blinks and says, "That shit ain't as bad as it usually is."

"It's not Jamestown shine," Gunther tells them. "It's Candy shine. Dianne brought it when she came to visit on the mailboat. Candy's started trading it to Oceanside. Henry bought her entire second batch for his pub. This is from her third batch. Apparently she's doing quite the business for herself."

"Good for her," Garland says. "Better shine than…the old business."

"Indeed. Eugene's treating her well, according to her last letter. Who knows? She might even fall in love with her husband one day."

"Stranger things have happened," Garland replies. "My wife fell in love with me."

Gunther chuckles.

Sweetheart reaches up for Daryl's empty shotglass. She gets on her tippytoes and strains to reach it, saying, "Thwisy, thwisty."

"I'll get them each a shot of lemonade," Gunther says. "I made it for the kids." He gets down two more shot glasses and pulls a mason jar of lemonade from the cooler.

"Why aren't you taking the orphan you sponsor trick or treating?" Garland asks.

"He's too old for that now. Or so he says. He went to the teenager's party in the museum's theater."

"Ain't he nine?" Daryl asks.

"Ten," Gunther replies. "And that's a teenager these days. I mean, the kid already knows how to shoot and ride better than I did at sixteen. And I grew up on a farm."

"Will you sponsor another orphan when he ages out?" Garland asks. At thirteen, the kids graduate from the upper school, start apprenticeships, and work to support themselves.

"Of course, if one comes up for sponsorship. Aren't they all covered?"

"For the time being," Garland answers. "But you know some people only sponsor for a year at a time and don't renew. Shannon and I would ourselves, but, you know…two kids to support now."

"Well, with the hours I work since becoming farm manager, and my private tobacco garden, I'm the richest man in Jamestown," Gunther says. "I think I've even surpassed Raul."

"Mhmmmmm!" Sweetheart says as she holds up her empty shot glass of lemonade to Gunther. VanDaryl has dribbled half his down his chin trying to drink from the little glass.

" _One_ more," Gunther tells her.

He refills VanDaryl's shot glass, too, but this time Garland helps the toddler get it to his mouth.

"We get seconds?" Daryl asks.

"Not if you want to stay on your feet," Gunther tells him.

"Don't feel a thing."

"But you will, if you have a second."

"I feel a thing," Garland says. "But Daryl's got about ten pounds on me."

"Think it's more like twenty pounds," Daryl tells him.

"No, you're just short," Garland ribs. "So it doesn't spread out as much."

"'M _average_ ," Daryl insists. "For a man."

"And tall for a woman."

"Stahp," Daryl growls, but he can't hold the scowl. It twitches into a smile. Garland's ribbing is gentler than Merle's ever was, but there's something brotherly about it, too. "Lightweight."

The two friends carry on. They trick or treat at the butcher and his wife's cabin next, where the kids each receive a strip of deer jerky. "Gotta pay the Daddy tax," Daryl tells Sweetheart as they leave. He fishes the jerky from her pumpkin and takes a bite.

"No!" she cries.

"Ya can't chew it. 'S tough, and ya only got four teeth."

Sweetheart puts a hand on her hip and stomps her foot. "No! Dada, no!"

The look in her eyes is so much like Carol's when Carol is angry that Daryl almost forgets, for a second, that the girl is not biologically theirs. "Let's see ya try to eat it," Daryl insists, handing her the stick.

Sweetheart puts it in her mouth and bites down with her four tiny teeth. She makes a face of disgust because the jerky is heavily salted. She pulls it straight out of her mouth – it's barely been punctured - and slides her tongue in out over and over as if she could thrust the taste away. Garland laughs and Daryl takes the jerky back. "Told ya so." He tears off another piece with his teeth, says, "Mhm, mhm, mhm," and swallows it down.

VanDaryl, after watching this display quietly, pulls out his jerky from his pumpkin and hands it straight to his father without attempting to taste it first. "Why thank you, son," Garland says, and the two men munch on deer jerky as the children toddle on.


	201. Chapter 201

The cork pops and Shannon fills each of their wine glasses, which are sitting on the coffee table, half full.

"Is this becoming an annual tradition?" Carol asks as she lifts the glass and looks at the light from the fire penetrating the crimson liquid with splases of pinkish-white.

"I certainly hope so. Though I guess the day is coming when we won't be able to find wine."

"I hear the Hilltop is starting to make it."

"Really? They're wasting their grapes on that?"

"They expect it to fetch a lot in trade to Jamestown." Carol takes a small sip of wine and then sits down on the couch.

"Well, they're probably not wrong there," Shannon admits. "Jamestown men do like their alcohol." She sits in the armchair and crosses her legs at the knee.

"Jamestown men?" asks Carol, nodding to Shannon's wine glass.

"This is only my second bottle in a _year_." She sips and lowers her glass. "And Garland's not getting any of it. You and I are drinking the whole thing tonight."

"Well, I can't argue with you when you've set your mind to something." Carol shrugs. "So I guess I'll just have to go along with the plan." She smiles and sips.

A knock at the door has her setting her glass down on the coffee table and grabbing the bowl. Shannon's not far behind. Sheriff Earl is at the door, with an eight-month-old Benjamin facing forward in a baby carrier on his chest. The little tyke sports a dark green cap with a brown feather, which sits slightly askew on the top of his blond hair, and his blue eyes are wide open with awe. A long-sleeve forest green onesie covers his arms and legs as well.

"Oh my God!" Shannon coos. "How cute!"

Carol takes the baby's little foot between her two fingers and shakes it. "Hello, Robin Hood."

Benjamin squeals happily and pulls his foot away.

Shannon nods to Earl's black cowboy hat. "And are you the Sheriff of Nottingham?"

"I'm just Dad tonight. And you don't have to give him anything. He'll just choke on it. I just wanted to show him off." Earl smiles proudly down at the boy who is the spitting image of the deceased Captain David Cummins.

"Can I give him a teething ring?" Carol asks. "I have a clean one, still in the plastic. Never opened."

"That would be great, actually. He's still working on his first tooth."

Carol digs around in the big bowl until she finds it, pulls it out and hands it to Earl, who doesn't have a bag or pumpkin on him. He rips the package open right there and hands the ring to Benjamin, who makes short work of putting it in his mouth. Carol takes the trash and wishes Earl and the baby a Happy Halloween.

[*]

When the men take Sweetheart and VanDaryl to the widow Kelly's cabin, Thomas is there. "I brought Kelly and Mrs. Merriweather some dinner," the deputy explains when he answers the door. "I made too much stew by accident."

" _Again_ ," Kelly says with a light smile as she approaches with a hand on her pregnant baby. "You have a lot of dinner preparation related accidents."

Thomas shrugs.

"Harry, who's that at the door?" Mrs. Merriweather calls from inside.

Kelly winces and Thomas closes his eyes.

"It's Halloween, Mama Merriweather," Kelly replies, disappearing inside. "And that's Thomas. Not Harry. Harry's…" She doesn't remind the senile old woman that her son is dead. "It's Halloween. The kids are trick or treating."

Thomas ends up handing out the treats to the kids before wishing them all a Happy Halloween and shutting the door.

"Mrs. Merriweather's having fewer clear moments," Garland says as they walk away. "At least she's in good hands, it seems. Kelly's stepping up. Thomas will, too, and not just because he probably wants the girl. He's a good man. A kind man. You don't find much of that in this world."

"Saved Carol," murmurs Daryl, thinking back to that gunshot wound in the forest long ago, before they knew Jamestown existed, when Thomas played medic and stopped her bleeding. "'N then he almost got her killed by that cult by bein' a dumbass and gettin' captured."

"Well, if you're going to choose one of those two to dwell on – "

"- Yeah," Daryl interrupts. "A'ight. Fair 'nuff."

They trick or treat at the cabin of Jeremy and Olivia next. The young couple's baby Hope is six months old and sleeping in a sling across her mother's chest. "We'll take her trick or treating next year," Olivia says. "I think she'd just sleep through it this year." The kids get jumbo crayons – red for Sweetheart and green for VanDaryl. Daryl wonders how they found ones that hadn't melted and resolidified repeatedly into a mishappen mass. He makes a note to keep Sweetheart away from the cabin walls with that thing.

The men go around to the other side of the cabin, to the second entrance – Sheriff Earl's half. Rosita opens the door with a hand on one hip and a bowl in the other. Daryl rocks back in surprise.

"Earl took Benji trick or treating," she explains, "so I agreed to hand out treats."

"Thought the mailboat went back yesterday?" Daryl says.

"Yeah, but clearly I didn't leave on it, Einstein."

"You're moving here?" Garland asks. "I suppose Earl's told you that you need to submit a resident application and you'll officially receive citizenship after -"

"- I'm _not_ moving here. I'm going back on your ship when it goes to the trade fair in two weeks."

"All passengers have to be approved by the Council," Garland tells her.

"Earl said it wouldn't be a problem, that you reserved two slots for non-Jamestown passengers, and Enid's the only other one going back on that ship."

"True, it won't be a problem, but you still need to get it _approved_."

"I _will_. I already put in the application. And I'll work for the two weeks while I'm here. Patrol. Watch. Mechanics. Whatever." Sweetheart looks up eagerly at the bowl Rosita holds in her hand. "But if _anyone's_ moving," Rosita continues, "it'll be Earl. I'm not living permanently in a cabin with no electricity or running water when I can live in a house in Alexandria."

"I'd hate to lose my sheriff," Garland says. "And isn't Alexandria getting full?"

Rosita shrugs. "Not my house. Candy moved in, but she's just taking up space in Eugene's room. Father Gabriel's got a room, and Siddiq and his wife have one. Earl can move into mine. And there's a study in our house that could just as easily be Benji's bedroom. Hell, we could still put someone in the attic if we needed to."

"I was thinking more about your _resources_ ," Garland replies. "You don't really farm."

"We garden. We have chickens. And rabbits. And I hear we're getting one of your pigs in trade at the fair, to make little piglets with the wild one we caught. We're doing just fine."

"Has Earl been _talking_ about moving? He hasn't said anything to me. To the Council."

" _If_ he moved," Rosita says, lowering the bowl so the eager kids can take a toy, "and I'm not saying he definitely _will_ , it wouldn't be until Benjamin is weaned from Olivia. That's another ten months at least." Sweetheart takes a small, dusty, Beanie baby kitten and drops it in her bowl. "You've got plenty of time to find a replacement. Earl says Santiago would make a good Sheriff."

Garland sighs. "I was hoping this alliance would gain us talent, not lose us it."

"Well, you'll probably get Dianne eventually, won't you?" Rosita asks. "She can fight, hunt, patrol, watch."

VanDaryl rummages through the bowl and grabs one toy, drops it in his pumpkin, and then grabs another. When he grabs a third, Garland scolds, "Just one!"

"He can have as many as he wants," Rosita says. "You should see how much Earl looted for Halloween. I've got two more bowls full when this one runs out."

Hearing this, Sweetheart takes another toy, a wooden spinning top, tries to bite it, clearly finds it unpalatable, and drops it in her pumpkin. Daryl puts a hand on her back and guides her away. "C'mon." He lifts her up and puts her in the red Radio Flyer wagon because they're done with the cabins in the fort, and the Indian village is too far up the path to toddle. Garland puts Van Daryl in as well, and the little boy falls backward into Sweetheart as Daryl lurches the wagon forward. Sweetheart laughs and pushes VanDaryl back up into a sitting position.

"Pumpkins're already more n' half full," Daryl notes, "And we ain't even hit the village or the dorms yet. Might have to crack out the pillowcases." Two are pooled in the wagon at the moment.

Garland smiles. "You kind of like this, don't you?"

Daryl shrugs. "Didn't get to do it as a kid. Mean, I _did_ do it as a kid. But not with my pa. He just stole m' candy if I didn't hide it under the porch."

"I keep forgetting what an upgrade this life is for you," Garland mutters. "I suppose it is for me, too, come to think of it. I mean…I had a good childhood. And I miss the comforts of the old world. The technology. I miss my sister. I miss being able to go for a walk outside the gates without having to stick my knife in the heads of cannibals. But I saw my share of monsters as a detective. And I didn't have a wife who loved me. And I certainly never would have been mayor of Richmond."

"We ain't done bad for ourselves," Daryl agrees. "Fuck, who'd of thought it?"

"Fwuck!' Sweetheart shouts from the wagon. VanDaryl imitates with a "Ffffffuuuuuh," which comes out like he's blowing raspberries.

"And my son would never have had such an educational godfather in the old world, I'm sure," Garland deadpans as they swing right and head to the first hut in the village.


	202. Chapter 202

Smoke puffs from the vent hole in the thatched roof of a hut. Sweetheart looks quizzically at the entry way. The colorful, plastic jeweled beads sparkle in the light from the torches that illuminate the pathway through the Indian village. When it gets very windy or rainy, the hut dwellers pull down thick paper blinds over the doors and windows, but most of the time, they're open for better ventilation of the fire. Daryl's grateful for his sturdy, lockable wooden door and shutters and, for his flue and chimney, and for a moment, he feels like one of the rich men in town.

"Twi ee twee!" Sweetheart yells through the beads. When a baby cries inside, Daryl shoots his eyes to the side of the door, just to double check that there's really a paper pumpkin tacked to the mud and straw to indicate trick or treaters are welcome. The beads rustle, clatter, and part. Trisha steps outside with her mousy brown hair disarrayed, her olive eyes tired, and the top of her house dress pulled down almost to her waist. Her infant suckles from one breast, while the other droops exposed.

"Come on in and get your treats," Trisha says.

The kids plow through the beads, and Garland and Daryl follow the former prostitute and ex-waitress inside. "Not getting much sleep?" Garland asks.

"No," Trisha replies. "Little John likes to suck my nipples even more than his namesake did." Garland flushes and Daryl looks away and wonders what Deputy Andrew thinks of Trisha naming the boy after Captain John Smith instead of after his own father. "I just hope he doesn't get teeth anytime soon."

"Well," Garland replies, averting his eyes from the exposed, baby-free breast, "it should be at least five or six more months before the first one comes in."

To the men's relief, Trisha switches breasts, and when the baby latches on again, she pulls up one side of her dress, covering the bare breast that doesn't have the baby on it. She nods to a cooler on the table. "I've got apple juice popsicles for the kids. Go on and help yourself."

Daryl opens the lid to find frozen cubes of apple juice in an ice cube tray, each one with a toothpick stuck in the middle. He works the tray until they loosen and slides one out for each of the kids. The men hold onto them, and lower them for the toddlers to lick, because if they hand them over, they might choke on the toothpicks or stick one in an eye.

Sweetheart licks and hums but is distracted by the calico cat that leaps off the shelving in the corner of the hut. "Kwittee!" She toddles after it, and frowns when it escapes through the beaded doorway.

"She's an outdoor cat," Trisha tells Sweetheart. "She just likes to come in and get warm by my fire sometimes. And sometimes I give her a little milk."

Sweetheart returns to her popsicle. She grabs Daryl's hand and yanks it down until she can put almost the whole cube in her mouth. "Lick," Daryl says. "Don't try to swallow it whole."

"Where's Andrew?" Garland asks.

"At the party at the tavern," Trisha answers.

"And he left you to handle the baby and all the trick or treaters alone?"

"Well, he deserves a break," Trisha says, somewhat defensively, but with a hint of skepticism in her voice that suggests she might not really mean it. "And he doesn't make any milk. What's he going to do with the baby?"

Garland raises an eyebrow but doesn't comment. The men make the kids thank Trisha – Sweetheart with a "tee you" and VanDaryl with a "dank," and then they slip through the beaded doorway. They put the kids back in the wagon and Garland supervises their consumption of the apple ice cubes while Daryl gently pulls the Radio Flyer on.

[*]

Shannon has just poured them each a second glass of wine when there's a knock on the door. The trick or treaters are fewer and farther between this year – more babies and toddlers, but fewer older kids. Some of the older ones must feel they've aged out, Carol thinks, which makes her feel strangely sad. Kids grow up much too quickly in this world, and that means Sweetheart might, too.

Mitch is at the door with his sponsored orphan girl, who wears what must be a store-looted costume. "Excellent Tiana," Carol tells her as she lowers the bowl.

"Who?" the girl asks.

"You're costume. It's a Disney princess, right? Tiana? From _The Princess and the Frog_?" Carol recognizes it, because Sophia begged her to take her to that movie twice, but Carol said no. Ed didn't like to spend money on movie tickets – he thought it was a waste - and they had to sneak there with Carol's sewing money in the first place.

The girl shrugs. "I just thought it was the prettiest one Uncle Mitch brought back." Of course she wouldn't know the movie, Carol thinks. This girl wouldn't have been born until almost a year after the apocalypse started, and the movie wasn't on DVD yet, so it's never been played in the Jamestown theater.

"Not trick or treating with Commander Witherspoon this year?" Shannon asks Mitch as she comes to stand beside Carol in the doorway.

Mitch scratches his head. "Uh…yeah…no. That sort of…we broke up. A few days ago."

"What!" Shannon exclaims. " _Why_?"

Mitch nods a warning and casts his eyes down at the girl. Shannon murmurs, "Sorry. Come for dinner on Friday. We'll talk then."

"Do we _have_ to talk?" Mitch asks warily.

"If you want my duck potpie we do."

Mitch half smiles. "Well, I _do_ want your duck potpie."

When Mitch and the girl move on and Carol closes the door, Shannon asks, "Did you know about this?"

"Yes," Carol admits.

"Then how did _I_ not know about this?"

Carol chuckles as she reclaims her wine glass and sits down. "That's a good question. You seem to know about _everything_ that goes on in Jamestown."

"Well, it's the closest thing I've got to television." Shannon eases into the armchair. "Do you know what happened?"

"Mitch told Daryl the age difference just got to be too much. Witherspoon developed an interest in a younger man, one closer to his own age."

"Oh, poor Mitch," Shannon murmurs with a genuine pity shining in her green eyes. "That surprises me of the commander. I didn't think he was the cheating type."

"Witherspoon didn't lie or cheat. He told Mitch openly before he acted on it. They parted as friends, sort of. Mitch is very hurt, of course, but I don't think he's angry."

"Poor Mitch," Shannon repeats. "Wait. _What_ younger man?"

"Devon."

"Devon?" Shannon half shouts. "The cult refugee? Kaitlyn's ex-boyfriend?"

Carol nods.

"Devon's gay?" Shannon asks. " _That's_ why Kaitlyn broke up with him? Not because of the…" Shannon makes a cutting motion across her lap with a finger.

"I think he's bisexual. I don't know. Daryl didn't ask Mitch."

"Of course Daryl didn't. Well, I guess now we know the commander's a top."

Carol swallows hard before wine can splutter from her lips. "Stop. We do _not_ know that or any other details of their sex life, and we don't _want_ to know either."

"Speak for yourself. Witherspoon's hot. Devon's kind of cute, too."

Carol shakes her head.

"Come on, admit it," Shannon teases.

"They're both young enough to be my sons."

"Sometimes I forget you have an eighteen-year-old son. I suppose when Gary's eighteen, I'll feel more guilty about admiring twenty-six-year old men."

Carol's sure Shannon's mostly joking, but she teases with a raised-eyebrow anyway: "Does Garland know about your admirations?"

"Garland's happy that I bring all my energy home to him and only him."

Carol chuckles.

"Garland must have known all this. They applied to the Council for property division?"

"Witherspoon moved back into the second officer's cabin on _The Discovery_. Mitch kept the hut. Since they weren't legally married, it wasn't really even a question."

"Garland didn't say a word to me about any of this." Shannon's consternation at being left out of the loop fades when another knock sounds at the door. The women hurry to answer.

[*]

The men pass three huts without paper pumpkins tacked out front and ease the wagon to a stop before Inola and Dante's hut. The men pluck the kids from the wagon so they can toddle up.

Dante greets them in the open doorway. His infant daughter Yona, who is almost four months old now, is sound asleep in a snugly against his chest. Her skin is the color of dark cherry wood, and she has thick curls of black hair. Dante lowers the wooden bowl so the kids can pick out a treat.

"Where's Inola?" Garland asks.

"Napping," Dante answers. "I'll have to wake her up in a hour to feed this little one. How's Shannon?"

"Good."

"Talk her out of taking Gary on that trade trip yet?"

Garland sighs. "No. No. I gave up on that."

"You should just put your foot down, mayor," Dante says with a smirk.

"Yeah, how does that work for you with Inola?"

"I'll let you know if I ever try it."

Garland chuckles.

"How's Carol?" Dante asks.

"Gettin' buzzed with Shannon," Daryl answers.

"Ah, treats for the men later then, huh? Lucky you." He glances behind himself back into the hut and then looks forward again. He lowers his voice. "I haven't gotten laid in months."

"It gets better," Garland assures him. "Yona's not sleeping through the night yet?"

"No, not this little monster," Dante says, and brushes a curl off the baby's forehead. "This adorable little monster. She'll be up at eight-thirty, then midnight, then three a.m." Dante rolls his eyes. "Then seven a.m."

"It _does_ get better," Garland insists. "Happy Halloween."

The men and kids continue trick or treating through the village until they reach the old, rectangular whorehut, which two childless couples from the Kingdom share. They begin to enquire after their former Queen Carol, and Garland excuses himself, leaving the kids with Daryl. "I just need to have a word with Andrew at the tavern," he explains.

Daryl doesn't know what _word_ Garland has with the deputy, but he can guess the gist of it when Andrew comes stomping down the pathway from the tavern, looking peeved but resigned, and makes his way home to his hut, wife, and newborn.

Daryl extracts himself from the Kingdom talkers, grabs hold of the handle of the Radio flyer, and drags the wagon on as Garland falls in step beside him. The sounds of the adult party at the tavern drift down the path after them – live music, chatter, laughing, and the occasional hoot or holler. "When're we ever gonna get to go to that party?" Daryl mutters.

"Do you _want_ to go to that party?" Garland asks skeptically.

"Nah," he admits. Daryl tugs the kids on back down the dirt path, past the orchard, past the cow pen – where VanDaryl waves to the sleepy cows and Sweetheart moos at them - down the hill, and eventually onto the wooden docks. The wheels of the wagon creak and clatter on the wood planks. The _Susan Constant_ sits empty. The two unmarried officers who live on board it in the officer's cabins - Captain McBride and Lieutenant Alvarado - are at the party in the tavern. Lieutenant Commander Lawson and his wife might be onboard the _Godspeed_ , but, if they are, their lights are out, and Daryl doesn't much want to trick or treat at that xenophobic prick's door anyway. Commander Witherspoon is not onboard the _Discovery,_ either _._ Maybe he's taking his orphan trick or treating, or maybe he's at the party in the tavern with Devon. Either way, the windows are dark, and the wagon rolls on.

They trick or treat in the museum, stopping at the room of Dr. Ahmad and his wife and then Dr. Emily and her husband. Dr. Emily has roasted pumpkin seeds to offer the dads and plastic wind-up toys for the toddler. "Only with supervision," she warns them as she puts one in each of their pillowcases, because the pumpkins are full. They stop by Kaitlyn's room in the former library. She and the sailor Merry are sitting in camp chairs out front, sharing some moonshine, with a bowl on the floor between them. The young guard Nick is hanging out in the hallway, attempting to flirt with the young woman, much to the chagrin of her new sailor boyfriend.

"We should all go to the party in the tavern," Nick tells her as the kids rummage through the bowl for their choices.

"After the trick or treaters stop coming by," Kaitlyn says. "This is fun. I missed it."

"Why don't _you_ go to the party?" Merry asks him pointedly. "Now?"

"I like seeing the kids in costume, too."

As the men leave with the kids and head out of the museum, Garland mutters, "I hope the deputies don't have to break up a fight later." Santiago's on patrol, Daryl knows. He was getting ready to leave when they trick or treated at his cabin. He's glad Carol's off tonight. She loves her traditions too much to miss a moment of it.

[*]

Not many rooms in the dorm have paper pumpkins tacked on their doors. One of the Kingdom women is giving out treats. So is Raul, and Enid is with him. Like Rosita, she came on the mailboat and is going back on the ship during the trade trip in November. She hands out lollipops from the Hilltop, made by the candy maker there.

"You have a candy maker?" Garland asks. "He just makes candy?"

"Nobody _just_ does any one thing," Enid replies. "But, yes, we have a candy maker. And Raul traded him for a lot of lollipops last time he was there." She rubs a hand over his shoulder. "He's very generous."

Raul smiles and shrugs. "I realized I had a few more things than I really needed."

The kid's not hoarding anymore, Daryl thinks. Not more than necessary, anyway. That's a good sign. Enid's done him well. He wonders who will end up where, or if they'll keep up this one-third-time thing forever: a third of their time together at the Hilltop, a third together in Jamestown, and a third apart in their separate communities. He couldn't do it. He used to spend months away from Carol, but now that they're married? He couldn't do it.

"What were my dad and Sarah giving out?" Raul asks.

"It's not a competition," Enid says.

"It kind of is. And I'm pretty sure we won."

"I don't know that you _have_ won," Garland tells him. "Santiago gave us each an ounce of whiskey." That's a lie. That was Gunther, and it was Candy shine. Santiago and Sarah gave the kids big, colored dice, and there was nothing for the dads. "What have _you_ got for us?"

Raul scratches the back of his head. "Well…I could…I guess I could let you have some of my vodka." He disappears into the room and returns with a bottle and two glasses. He pours an ounce and half in each, and the men knock them back, thank Raul, and head on.

"Nice maneuver," Daryl tells the mayor with a smirk.

"Are you going to be able to pull this wagon home?"

"'Course. Two drinks in two hours? Think I can handle it."

They stop at Dwight and Sherry's last. When Sweetheart sees her favorite daycare worker, who has been taking some time off since the baby, she throws herself around her legs. Sherry laughs and hugs her and then offers her a treat from the bowl. Dwight approaches with the infant Dwight, Junior cradled in his arms. "Hey, Daryl," he says.

Daryl grunts his hello. Daryl doesn't talk to Dwight, not unless he has to, but he'll talk to Sherry, when their paths cross. He's grateful she freed him from Negan's clutches, and he figures Dwight can't be all bad if she loves him. Still, he doesn't care to talk to Dwight if he can avoid it. He fights the old grudge that rises up like heartburn in his chest, and he's glad when the door closes.

The men plop the kids back into the wagon outside the dorms, and they begin the walk home. The babies are dead asleep and curled back-to-back in the wagon when they reach the fort. There won't be any trading candy tonight.

"Garland!" Shannon whispers to her husband as she comes out the front door. At least she _thinks_ she's whispering. "I'm a little tipsy."

Garland smiles as he plucks his little sleeping boy out of the wagon. "Good. Because this one's already out and Gary's spending the night at Albert's. Grab my arm and I'll walk you home."

Daryl leaves the wagon out front and settles Sweetheart into bed. Carol removes the paper pumpkin from outside – though the trick or treating hours are over anyway – and latches the door shut.

Daryl pulls the curtain closed around Sweetheart's room and goes to join Carol on the couch before the hearth where the fire is already crackling. And empty wine bottle sits on the coffee table next to two empty glasses.

"Looks like she got a lot of loot," Carol says.

"Hell yeah," Daryl agrees. "Went through the whole damn town this time. Cleaned up."

"Any treats for me?" Carol's eyes are shiny. She probably had two glasses of wine, and Shannon must have had three. That wouldn't be a lot in the old world, but in this day and age, when they don't get to drink often, and when they don't ever overeat…it's enough for a light buzz. In fact, he's feeling that vodka just a tiny bit.

Daryl smirks. "I gotta treat ya can lick. 'N suck."

Carol rolls her eyes. "What are you. Thirteen?" She laughs. Then she shrugs. "Okay."

"Okay?" he asks, not sure if she's serious.

"Yeah. Okay. Sure. Why not? Who _doesn't_ want a sucker for Halloween?"

Daryl stands and eagerly starts unbuckling his belt.

Later, when he's leaned back against the stone side of the hearth, his bare claves hot from the fire, still reeling from the blow job, Carol gets up from her knees, kisses his check, and whispers, "My turn," before walking toward their bedroom. Daryl follows, tripping on the pants around his ankles, nearly falls, but steadies himself. He works his way out of them and pulls the curtain closed around their bed as she lights a candle on the nightstand. When Carol sets down the match box, he throws her, giggling, back-down onto the bed.

The next thirty minutes is playful and satisfying and ends in a naked, sleepy cuddle beneath the blankets. "Should make this a Halloween tradition," Daryl murmurs into her hair. "Know how ya love yer traditions."

Carol giggles. "Maybe we should." She settles back against him, spoons into the curve of his muscular frame, and tucks her head under his chin.

"Nite, Beautiful."

"Night, Pookie. Happy Halloween."


	203. Chapter 203

A mid-November wind billows the sails of the _Susan Constant_ as it plows slowly but steadily through the dark green waters of the James River, sending white foam frothing around its bow. Ensign Merry keeps watch via telescope high in the crow's nest, while Lieutenant Alvarado gets some practice manning the wheel and Captain McBride strolls the deck, his hands clasped behind his back, calling to attention the sailors who have paused to flirt with the female passengers.

Rosita and Enid, returning from Jamestown via Oceanside to their respective homes, along with Shannon, receive the most attention, despite the fact that the sailors know each one is spoken for. After all, their men remain behind in Jamestown – Earl to play Sheriff and father to Benji, Garland to play mayor and father to VanDaryl, and Raul to play farm manager in Gunther's absence. Later, Raul will take the last December mailboat to Oceanside, march on foot to the Hilltop, and spend the long, cold winter there by Enid's side. In spring the young couple will part, each to the work of their own communities.

For now, Daryl and Carol have settled around a barrel to play Rummy 500 with Mitch and Gunther.

"Dixon!" Captain McBride booms as he does a half twirl to avoid a careening toddler, "Get this child out from under foot!"

Carol throws down her cards. "I thought Enid and Shannon were watching her."

Enid and Shannon were, but, as it turns out, Gary got it into his head to play tag with the little girl, and they both got out from under the women's watch. When Carol returns to the card table with her errant daughter, she sits down and settles Sweetheart on her lap. The little girl leans back against her mother's chest and tugs on her ear, which means she's getting sleepy.

"Be out soon," Daryl murmurs as he discards.

Carol picks up her hand of cards and glances over to where a sailor is squatting down to talk to Gary. He's feigning interest in the boy, but Carol can tell it's Shannon he's really interested in, by the way he looks at her and smiles when she approaches to thank him for corralling Gary.

"Seaman Lincoln!" Captain McBirde shouts. "Stop flirting with the mayor's wife and get back to swabbing the decks!"

The sailor leaps from his haunches. "Yes, sir!"

"I didn't think you were coming on this trip, Mitch," Gunther tells the hunter who has just drawn a card.

Mitch lays out three Jacks before himself. "I bought the spot off a builder. I just needed to get away for a few days. To get out of Jamestown."

Commander Witherspoon is home in Jamestown, in charge of the navy in the captain's absence, and Carol thinks Mitch wants a break from seeing him with Devon. A change of scenery might do the hunter some good.

"Mhm," Gunther murmurs. "I heard."

"Heard what exactly?" Mitch asks.

"About the break-up."

"I blame you for throwing us _publicly_ together," Mitch mutters. "It was a year ago today, wasn't it? Maybe if he'd stayed in the closet I'd at least still be getting laid."

"Closets are cramped," Gunther replies. "Sex is better when you have room to move around."

Mitch snorts. "You make it hard for me to dislike you sometimes."

"Well, if at first you fail, try, try again. Then give up. No sense being a damn fool about it." Gunther plays a Jack off of Mitch's cards and then discards.

Rosita pulls up a wooden deck chair and squeezes in. It's a tight fit around the barrel, with five people now. "Deal me in. I'm tired of getting hit on by sailors."

"After this round," Daryl mutters as he draws. "Earl ain't comin'?"

"No. He's got a baby to deal with," Rosita replies. "I'm just hitching a ride home."

"You think Jamestown will ever be home?" Gunther asks.

"I'm on the Council in Alexandria. I'm second-in-charge of security after Michonne. And I have running water and electricity. So no."

"I thought you were on the council at the _Hilltop_ ," Mitch says.

"No. There is no council at the Hilltop. They have a triumvirate. Jesus and Tara and Enid."

"Enid?" Carol asks in surprise. She knew Enid _advised_ the triumvirate, but she didn't know Enid had _become_ one of them. "What about Aaron?"

"Aaron stepped down after the break-up," Rosita says. "He and Gracie moved back to Alexandria. He took the last bedroom in the Big House, and she's in the attic. Not a bad spread for a seven-year-old girl."

"What?" Carol asks, while Gunther says, "I'm out" and lays down his last card.

While Mitch adds up the points in a small notebook and Daryl sweeps the cards back into a pile and begins shuffling, Rosita explains, "Aaron and Jesus broke up, so Aaron moved back to Alexandria. He's on our council now."

"Why did they break up?" Carol asks.

"I don't know. Probably because Jesus can be as annoying as fuck sometimes."

Daryl shrugs as though he doesn't quite disagree with that and deals another hand, dealing Rosita in this time.

"It sounds like Alexandria is getting crowded," Gunther says.

"One guy left last month to move in with a woman from Oceanside," Rosita says as she pulls her hand to herself and arranges her cards, "and another woman left to move in with a man from Hilltop, so it's balancing out. The bedrooms are all full, but we still have attics and living rooms. We could definitely expand our farming though."

" _Expand_ it? I didn't know you farmed at all. I thought you only gardened."

"We've planted one field, outside the gates, fenced in with barbwire. But we need more. We rely too much on trade. And we're starting to get goats. Pigs." Rosita looks over her hand at Gunther. "You ever think of moving to Alexandria?"

Gunther picks and discards. "No."

"Oceanside?" Rosita asks as Carol takes her turn, careful not to disturb Sweetheart, who is almost asleep. "For Dianne? You could visit on occasion to help us. A week here, a week there. We'd pay you of course. Room and board and Candy shine."

"Jamestown is home. I haven't lived anywhere else since it all started. I mean, not since I left my own farm in Roanoke."

"Well, you know," Rosita tells him. "Dianne's an advisor at Oceanside. She's in the government there."

"I'm aware. And I'm on the Council in Jamestown. I'm also the head farm manager now. For 600 people."

As Daryl discards, Rosita shrugs and says, "Dianne might not want to leave Oceanside."

"I'm aware."

"Are you proposing to her again?" Rosita asks. "I heard you got shot down the first time."

"Does _everyone_ know about this?" Gunther sighs and folds his cards together. "I'm bowing out. I should check on the animals below deck. Carolyn said Orwell was a bit restless." He scrapes his chair back and walks away.

"Leave the poor man alone," Carol tells Rosita.

"I don't know what Dianne sees in him. He's ten years older than her and almost as unkempt as Daryl."

"Ain't anywhere near as unkempt as me," Daryl insists.

Carol chuckles. Her chuckle wakes a drifting-off Sweetheart, who cranes her neck back, looks up, and says, "Mama." Carol kisses her forehead, and the little girl closes her eyes again.

"Aaron?" Mitch asks. "Is he the one with the long hair?"

Rosita rolls her eyes toward him. "Jesus is the one who looks like Jesus."

"Well, Jesus was Semitic and probably had short, tight, curly hair," Mitch rejoins.

"Fine," Rosita says. "Aaron's the one who looks like a model from the L.L. Bean catalogue, if that helps you recall him."

"Ah. That one."

[*]

It's smooth sailing toward Oceanside. No pirates attack. The afternoon of the second day, Sweetheart finally gets her wish to inhabit the ship's crow's nest. While Captain McBride keeps the ship steady, Lieutenant Alvarado straps the toddler in a backpack and brings her all the way to the top, where she gazes out on the Jamestown River flowing into the Chesapeake Bay. Carol stands below, a nervous knot tying and tangling itself in her stomach. She's not sure _why_ she's nervous. The lieutenant isn't going to toss Sweetheart out of the basket, or let her climb down from that backpack. If Carol feels this nervous now, what's she going to feel the first time her daughter slays a walker?

She jumps slightly as Daryl's arm slides around her waist, but then, realizing it's only him, she molds against his side and rests her head on his shoulder. "You think she's loving it up there?"

"Know she is."

"Commander Witherspoon thinks she'll be a sailor." Maybe the first female officer of the Jamestown Navy, Carol thinks, although surely the one female seamen or the one female seaman apprentice will climb the ranks before Sweetheart is even out of school. Then again, maybe not. None of the officers is over forty-five, and their health seems good, except maybe for Lieutenant Commander Lawson, who is rumored to be showing signs of gout.

Alvarado climbs back down cautiously and returns the child to its parents. Once Sweetheart is in Daryl's arms, she points to the basket of the crow's nest. "Up!" she insists. "Up, Dada, up!"

[*]

They sail into the bay and reach the shore where Oceanside is nestled in the early evening, before the sun has set, a night before the fair is scheduled to start. Sailors make haste to wrap and tie ropes and bind the ship to the docks, which are full of friends and family and lovers eager to greet their Jamestown guests.

Dianne embraces Gunther and offers him a quick peck on the lips before immediately taking his hand and tugging him toward shore. She looks back at Carol just long enough to say, "You're staying in my cabin. But give us awhile before you bring your stuff in?"

Carol nods.

Cyndie laughs as Captain McBride lifts and twirls her by her hips and plants her on her feet before swallowing her mouth in a kiss. She pushes him gently away. "Slow down, Captain. I haven't agreed to a tour of the ship just yet."

Captain McBride grins, and then turns his attention to ordering some sailors to unload the tents for those who will be camping on shore.

Henry embraces Carol, kisses his little sister, and says, "Rachel's resting. She's big as a house now. And she's still got three months!"

"Well I hope you don't tell _her_ that!" Carol scolds.

Henry chuckles.

"Has Michonne arrived?" Lieutenant Alvarado asks Cyndie.

Cyndie shakes her head, "The Alexandria contingent will probably arrive in the morning, about when the fair starts."

An Oceanside woman with a young infant swaddled in her arms approaches Ensign Merry. The navy man blinks and points at the baby. "You're not going to try to say that's mine, are you?" he asks.

McBride, who is standing nearby, watches the exchange with a wary eye.

"I don't know whose else it would be," the Oceanside woman says. "I wasn't sleeping in anyone else's tent last November."

Merry runs a hand over his mouth. He swallows. "But…I…I have a girlfriend now. At Jamestown. You didn't even write!"

"I knew it was just a two-night stand," she tells him. "Look, I don't _expect_ anything of you. Just a few things maybe, from whatever you brought for trade? And maybe a little something on the mailboat twice a month. Child support, you know? Not a lot. Just _something_."

"You didn't even write me!" Merry puts a hand on her shoulder and begins leading her down the docks, away from the onlookers. He whispers hurriedly to her as they walk.

Captain McBride says to Cyndie, "Why didn't you tell me what my crewman had gotten up to?"

"I didn't think it was my business to tell you when the mother hadn't even told the father. And besides, you _knew_ what your crewmen were getting up to last November. You were getting up to it yourself."

"I wasn't getting anybody pregnant!" He looks her up and down. "Was I?"

Cyndie shakes her head and chuckles. "No. I think you would have noticed by now, one of the six times I've been in Jamestown."

McBride lets out a puff of frustrated air. "I cautioned the boys to be careful."

"Yeah, well, we don't exactly have drugstores anymore," Cyndie tells him. "She had a healthy pregnancy. A safe delivery. And she wants the kid. And if we're going to have a future…" She shrugs.

Captain McBride shifts from one foot to the other. "You…think about that? Having kids to have a future?"

"I'm the leader of this community. I _have_ to think about it."

"But… _you_ think about it?"

"Don't worry, Captain," she tells him with a pat to his broad shoulder. "I'm still in my twenties. And I'm very busy. I'm certainly not looking to settle down anytime soon."

"Come on, Mom," Henry tells Carol. "I'll show you my pub. And you can have some Candy shine. On the house."

"I think I'd rather have some of that wine you found on that supply ship that washed up."

"Well, that's _expensive_. That can't be on the house."

Daryl huffs. "Give yer mama a free glass of wine, kid." He takes Sweetheart from Carol's arms. "I'll watch 'er while you go."

Shannon has come down the ship's ramp to the docks with Gary. They were one of the last ones off because Gary fell asleep in one of the crew's bunks, after an afternoon of running helter skelter all over the ship, rough housing with some friendly sailors, and even getting to steer the wheel with the help of Captain McBride. Cyndie welcomes her, and says, "You and your boy can stay in my cabin tonight. Come on. I'll show you around."

"It's like a little paradise," Shannon says in awe as she follows Cyndie down the docks, with Gary walking by her side and rubbing sleep dust from his eyes after his impromptu nap. "As soon as he's not mayor anymore, I'm making Garland take me on a second honeymoon here. Well, more like a first."


	204. Chapter 204

Carol relaxes against the low back of the metal stool that stands before the oak wood bar. The stools came out of the mess hall storage closest, clearly, but Henry built the bar himself. She likes the place. She likes the décor too – the fishing spears and nets on the wall, the red and white lifesaver, the shells, the large piece of driftwood with the letters HENRY'S carved out to make a sign. It reminds her of that seafood restaurant she went to once a year as a child, on her birthday – all you can eat popcorn shrimp. And hushpuppies. God how she misses hushpuppies.

She lifts her crystal wine glass. Henry looted a Pier 1, apparently, for his dinnerware. Nobody had bothered to ransack _those_. Carol takes a slow sip of the French Bordeaux and savors it on her tongue. Henry didn't comp her the glass, but he did offer her a discount, and she paid the difference in ammo because, well, her son owns his own business now. He's a _restaurateur_. Not a profession she ever would have guessed for him in this world. Blacksmith, maybe. But not _restaurateur_. She likes the sound of that word. It goes well with her French wine.

"You overpriced all the Old World wine," Linda tells Henry as she looks over the handwritten drink menu he's just handed her. She accompanied Henry and Carol to the pub because she wanted to see how her young mentee was doing – and Henry wanted her advice. She now sits at a stool at the end of the bar with a crystal whiskey glass containing an ounce of Candy shine to her left.

"How do you figure?" Henry asks from behind the bar, where he's playing bartender to his two lone guests. He expects a crowd to come in after dinner, though, when the Jamestown visitors have pitched their tents on the shore or are settled into guest rooms in the cabins, and the Oceansiders have finished setting up for tomorrow's fair. A towel hangs from his belt loop, ready to be used for wiping down the bar if any sailor gets a little too drunk and spills. It's going to be his biggest night since he opened, he told Carol. He's sure he'll fill his coffers with rounds and rounds of ammo. "It's all _good_ wine. French wine. Italian wine. California wine. You can't get that _anywhere_ else."

"We still have some California wine," Linda tells him. "They found some in the cult's apartment complex. A couple of bottles of South American wine, too."

"The cult?" Henry asks.

"It's a long story. I'm sure your mother will tell you."

"This sounds good," Henry say to Carol. "You should enter the storytelling contest tomorrow."

"I think I'd rather enter the archery competition."

"You can enter both."

"I'm not much for public speaking, Henry."

"Yeah. That was always Dad, wasn't it? God, he would have _loved_ the storytelling competition. He'd have won the gold the last three years running." He turns his face back to Linda. "What's wrong with my wine prices?"

"They're almost twice mine for Old World wine."

"Well people can't exactly hop over to the Jamestown Tavern. I don't think you're much competition for me. No offense."

"Has anyone bought it yet?" Linda asks.

"My mom's drinking it."

Carol tries not to laugh.

"Because you gave it to her at a discount," Linda says. "And she's your _mother_. Listen, my ambitious apprentice, it's the apocalypse. People want to get pissed. They don't want fine dining. And you've underpriced the Candy shine." She takes her second sip. "Which is _surprisingly_ good for shine. Is Candy coming to the fair?"

"I doubt it," Henry answers. "Eugene will, and he'll bring more of her shine to trade. But she's due in January. Even before Rachel. Not really a time to be traveling. She hasn't left Alexandria once since she got there."

"Well, she hadn't left Jamestown once until she moved to Alexandria," Linda says. "I hate to say it, but I miss her. Gunther does, too. Surely she'd come to see Gunther, at least?"

Henry shrugs. "I don't know. Maybe. You really think I should lower the price of the wine? I'd lose money."

"Not if you also raise the price of the Candy shine."

"But then they'd buy less Candy shine."

"No, they wouldn't."

Henry crosses his arms over his chest. "Why wouldn't they?"

"Because, refer back to my point A."

"Which was?" Henry asks.

"People just want to get pissed in the apocalypse. And the Candy shine will still be the cheapest thing on your menu. But if you raise the price of the shine," Linda moves the index finger on her left hand up, "and lower the price of the wine," she moves the index finger on her right hand down, until the tips are only two inches apart, " the wine won't seem nearly as expensive. The price differential will shrink. People will be more willing to upgrade to it, every now and then."

"Huh. Okay. I might do that. What about my prices for the Hilltop wine?"

"Well, I don't know." Linda shoots back the rest of her Candy shine and pushes her glass forward. "I'll have to taste it before I can tell you."

"I suppose you expect that on the house, too?" Henry asks.

"Consider it my consultant's fee."

Carol chuckles.

"You think this is funny, Mom?" Henry asks. "The way she's milking me?"

Carol raises her glass casually. "You have to spend money to make money, Henry, sweetie."

Henry shakes his head but goes to pull down a deerskin flask full of Hilltop wine.

[*]

Sweetheart toddles across the shore, chasing the incoming foam of a wave. Daryl hasn't managed to get her away from the beach and into the village yet, but that's okay. Carol needs her time with Henry at his new pub, and he can't drop all their stuff off at Dianne's cabin yet, not when she's probably knocking boots hello with Gunther.

Sweetheart's pliable deer-skin moccasins – which Inola made her in exchange for some coffee beans when her feet outgrew the first pair of shoes Daryl looted – are tucked into the inside pocket of his black leather vest at the moment, and she stands now and giggles as the cold water washes over her bare feet. She slaps her feet up and down in the surf, her toes sinking into the sand each time. She toddles backwards to escape the watery assault. "Code code!"

"Well, yeah, 's gonna be cold. 'S November. Ain't swimmin' weather."

Sweetheart ventures forward a little and points. "Dat?"

"Kelp," Daryl answers.

"Whelp!"

"K – K – Kelp."

Sweetheart squats down and picks up the scraggly, wet, gooey, black-green strings. "Ewwww! Yucky whelp!" She shakes it off her fingers.

"Actually, seaweed probably," Daryl muses. "Don't think they got kelp 'n the Bay. Don't know the diff'rence really. Ain't a forest plant. Know m' forest plants. Don't know m' sea plants. Just know kelp 'n seaweed's diff'rn. Think kelp might be brown."

Sweetheart is wholly uninterested in her father's instructional monologue. She toddles on down the shore in search of more discoveries.

A fishing boat is docking alongside the _Susan Constant_. There's not much room for it in the great shadow of the colonial replica ship, but the Oceanside women who clamor to the dock manage to bind it. Daryl shades his eyes with a hand and gazes out at it. Beatrice is there, and some woman he doesn't know, and … _Rachel_? Henry said she was resting. What's she doing on a fishing boat? She's very obviously pregnant, even if she's just barely started her third trimester.

"Dat? Dada, dat?" Daryl turns his attention to Sweetheart, who is again pointing to an object on the shore. "Dat?"

"'S a seashell. Clam shell probably. Don't really know m'shells. Know m'fish. Creek fish. River fish."

"Swell?" Sweetheart asks.

"Shell. Sh – Sh -Shell."

"Swell!" Sweetheart squats down and tries to dig it out of the sand. Eventually she manages to get it, stands, and holds it up to Daryl. "Dada swell."

"M'shell?" he asks in mock surprise. He takes it from her fingers. "Thanks. Gonna treasure it 'til next Tuesday, at least." He slips it into the front pocket on his pants, the one near the knee. He loves these pants. Thick canvas, only a couple of rips, and so many pockets. He looted them from the apartment complex of those assholes who killed Harry and Laura. Someone was just his size.

The women are on shore now, and Rachel makes her way to Daryl. "Hey." She looks down at Sweetheart, who has stooped down to collect another shell. "Henry's been to visit Jamestown," she tells the little girl," but _I_ haven't seen you since you were a baby. You've gotten so big!"

Sweetheart peers up at her with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

"God," Rachel says. "She looks just like you when you're giving someone that _who the hell do you think you are?_ look."

Daryl grunts. He doesn't know what look she's talking about. "Henry said you was restin'."

"I _was_ resting. Fishing is very peaceful. Don't worry." She lays a hand on her belly. "I wasn't hauling up nets. I just dropped a line. Henry hates me going out on the boat. He thinks I should be his little woman and stay home by the fire."

"Doubt that."

Rachel shrugs. "He thinks I should stop going out on the fishing boat for a few months, anyway."

Daryl doesn't comment. He's not getting in the middle of his wife's son's marital disputes. Sweetheart has toddled ahead. She's squatting down. She looks back. "Dat? Dada, dat?" she asks.

Daryl strolls forward, and Rachel follows.

"Whelp!" Sweetheart says, picking up whatever has washed up. "Whelp!" She turns and holds the object up, her little hands tangled in the long mass of green-black…hair. It's _hair_. Not kelp. Not seaweed. _Hair_. And attached to the hair is a mishappen face.


	205. Chapter 205

A/N: Quick recap - the timeline and events of this story diverged from the show immediately after the first (short) time jump following the defeat of the Saviors. (The second longer time jump didn't happen in this story, at least not as it happened on the show.) They never encountered the Whisperers or Magna's group. Henry, Tara, and Jesus are still alive, but Maggie and Ezekiel are both dead.

[*]

Daryl lunges forward and grabs the face from Sweetheart's hand. "Ain't kelp," he says. "'S a walker skin. What the hell?" He turns over the dry facial skin and finds it half sewn up in the back. "The fuck? 'S like a mask."

Sweetheart bursts into a torrent of tears, maybe because of Daryl's shocked, deep voice, or maybe because of the grotesque mask, or maybe a bit of both. Daryl drops the mask and picks her up. "Yer a'right!" he reassures her. "Baby girl, yer a'right. Yer fine. Look. Daddy's fine. Yer fine."

Sweetheart swallows hard. She looks down at the mask he's dropped. Her little lip trembles like the omen of another impending cry.

"Hey!" Daryl barks. At the sound of her daddy's voice, Sweetheart looks back up and into his eyes. "Told ya," he says more softly. "Yer a'right. Would yer daddy lie to ya?"

Sweetheart's trembling lip stills. She swallows again.

"Yer a'ight," Daryl repeats. "Ain't ya?"

Sweetheart nods.

"Yeah?"

"Weetie ahhh ite."

"Good."

"It's from one of those Skins," Rachel says. "They must have tossed it in the creek, and it floated to the Bay and washed up here."

"Skins?" Daryl asks.

"Cyndie will explain. She wants your council to meet with ours in the morning, before the fair starts, as soon as the other leaders arrive."

[*]

Daryl's annoyed he has to wait until morning to get an explanation for the bizarre mask Sweetheart combed from the beach, but Cyndie doesn't want to have to repeat the same details over and over as the leaders of the communities trickle in. She doesn't want to cause alarm, she says, and there's no immediate threat – "If there was," she assures Daryl, "I wouldn't be proceeding with the fair. Now I have work to do."

Despite Cyndie's assurances, Daryl's anxious and annoyed. He tells Carol what he's found, even though he doesn't want to worry her, because he can't stand keeping it to himself, and she notices he's anxious anyway – with that sixth sense she sense to have about him. He's going to that meeting in the morning, he tells her, even though he's not actually _on_ the Jamestown Council.

"I'm sure no one will boot you out," Carol assures him.

[*]

That evening, about the time when the fish are cooked, the Hilltop contingent filters in – including Jesus and Tara. Jerry and Nabila bring their brood of children, including their latest addition, their one-year-old daughter Jeri. Maggie and Glenn's orphaned son Hershel is with them, too, and Daryl gets down on his knees to embrace the boy he once half-helped to raise. He's become a child of Hilltop now, with mothers in Enid and Nabila and Tara, and fathers in Jesus and Jerry and, when he's visiting Enid, a sort of big brother in Raul.

Carol is happy to see her old right-hand man from the Kingdom and to introduce Jerry to her own daughter. It's not long before the big bearded man is offering Sweetheart piggyback rides, and all the other kids want to join in, too.

Gary and Hershel make fast friends, mainly because Gary offers the older boy not one but _two_ of his prized matchbox cars, and they soon build ramps with old planks of wood against the end of the benches of the picnic table where Daryl and Carol now sit finishing their dinner. For now, they're content to leave Sweetheart to play with her gaggle of new friends under Jerry's supervision as they dine with Shannon and Nabila – who have been as quick as Hershel and Gary to make friends. Tara joins them with a plate of fresh food, and Nabila smiles. "I see you finally escaped the Jamestown veterinarian."

"I don't know how to tell her that just because we're the last two lesbians on earth doesn't mean we have to get together."

"Carolyn?" Shannon asks.

"Sorry," Tara murmurs. "I don't mean to insult any of your people."

"No, I'm just surprised," Shannon assures her. "I thought she said she wasn't interested."

"She sure _acts_ interested," Tara mutters.

"Well, I doubt very much you two are actually the last two lesbians on earth," Shannon tells her. "And people can be flexible when circumstances dictate."

Tara laughs. "Yeah, well, I haven't met anyone that flexible yet."

"Have you introduced yourself to _everyone_ at Oceanside?" Shannon asks. "Because I'm pretty sure I've met at least two lesbians since I've been here."

"Maybe you can lend me your gaydar for the fair tomorrow," Tara tells her.

"You laugh, but I'm very perceptive when it comes to people."

"We hear you lost Aaron to Alexandria?" Carol says.

Tara sighs. "Yeah. But thankfully Enid's stepped up. Jesus and I couldn't handle the Hilltop alone."

"What happened?" Carol's not interested in the gossip. She's disturbed by the break-up. Jesus and Aaron have been together longer than she and Daryl have. She thought of them as a near sure thing.

"Sometimes relationships fall apart," Tara says. "People drift apart, they get too caught up in their own worries, they squabble, they don't make time for each other, things implode."

Carol glances at Daryl and then returns her attention to Tara. "That just doesn't make sense."

"Or, hell, maybe the sex wasn't good," Tara says. "I don't know. I didn't ask. Aaron just handed me his resignation, packed up his things and Gracie, and moved to Alexandria. Alexandria was always his home, anyway. He only settled at the Hilltop for Jesus."

[*]

Carol tucks an exhausted Sweetheart into the bed of one of the spare rooms in Dianne's cabin. Daryl kisses her forehead. He double checks his knapsack, and Carol follows him out of the bedroom and then the front door, where she kisses him goodnight. He's having a camp out with Hershel and Gary in a tent they're pitching on the shore. There will be a campfire and scary stories and matchbox car races in the sand and other manly things. "You're a good godfather," she tells him.

"Just wish Judith and RJ were here already," he says. "But I guess Little Ass Kicker's probably gettin' too old to camp with boys."

Carol snorts. "I don't think you have to worry about the co-ed thing just yet. Maybe when Hershel and Garry are 13 and 14 and she's 15." She rests a hand on his hip. The flames of tiki torches flicker in the brackish Bay air outside a few of the cabins and along the path to Henry's new pub. Sounds of laughter and merriment and live music drift down toward them, and Carol is sure Henry was right – he'll make quite the profit tonight. "It's weird, isn't it? About Aaron and Jesus?"

"Guess."

"Did Aaron say anything to you?"

"Ain't here yet. Alexandria'll get here in the mornin'."

"I meant in a letter, or something. Doesn't he write you?"

"Sometimes. Not 'bout that."

Carol sighs. "They were together longer than _us_."

Her worry must be apparent in her voice, because Daryl puts a palm against her cheek and says a soft, "Hey. Hey. No they ain't been."

"They have."

"I mean…yeah. They been knockin' boots longer 'n us. But us? We been together since the start. Always been there for each other. Just took us a little longer to figure out the boot knockin' part."

Carol chuckles. She puts a hand over his hand on her cheek. She turns her head slightly to kiss his palm. "Yeah," she agrees quietly.

"Love ya, Beautiful," he whispers.

"I love you too, Pookie."

Daryl leans in to kiss her. When he pulls away, he half growls, "Behave while 'm gone."

"Nothing to worry about." Dianne is booting Gunther out for a few hours. He'll probably hang out at Henry's pub and drink herbal tea and make new friends and play cards with Mitch or chess with Linda. Shannon's coming over to the cabin, and so is Tara, Enid, and Rosita. Nabila was invited, but the kids have wiped her out, and she just wants to turn in early. The women will be hanging out together in the living room and sharing a small mason jar of Candy shine Gunther purchased from the tavern and gifted to Dianne. "Just us chickens."

"Yeah. 'S what 'm afraid of."

"Don't worry. I always tell them how good you are in bed."

Daryl flushes. "Stahp."

Carol chuckles and kisses his nose. "Have a good time with your godsons."

[*]

"Candy has done a surprisingly good job with this!" Shannon declares as she passes the mason jar of Candy shine to Tara, who takes a small sip and passes it to Carol, who takes a very small sip because she's already had that one glass of wine at Henry's pub this afternoon, and she doesn't want to be too indulgent. The women sit on the circular rug on the floor of Dianne's living room, the fire crackling in the fireplace nearby. Rosita sips next, and then passes the jar to Enid, who passes it to Dianne without drinking. Dianne has a far bigger sip than expected.

"Whoa, slow down there, chugger," Rosita says. "Trouble in paradise?"

"Gunther took me on a romantic picnic for dinner," Dianne mutters. "In a secluded spot along the beach. Candlelight and pork steaks and fresh vegetables he brought from Jamestown."

"Oh, how terrible," Shannon says. "I always hate it when Garland takes me on romantic picnics."

Tara laughs.

"Yeah, I'm not seeing the problem here," Enid admits.

"It was such a big show." Dianne passes the mason jar back to Shannon. "I thought he was going to propose. And he just… _didn't_."

"Do you want him to propose?" Rosita asks. "Rumor in Alexandria is you shot him down."

"That's the word on the streets of Hilltop, too," Enid says.

"I didn't know the Hilltop had streets," Rosita says.

"You haven't been in three months," Tara tells her. "We do now. Well, one street, really, that leads from the west site to the east site. It's a fenced-in street. A tunnel almost. If tunnels had no tops. More of a walkway, really. Broad enough for horse and cart, though."

"I didn't _shoot him down_ ," Dianne insists. "I told him to give us some time to date a little longer, and give me some time to think about it, and then ask me again in November, if we were still together."

"And you're still together," Rosita observes.

"It's not my place to say," Shannon tells her, "but I think you wounded his pride a little bit. I wouldn't count on another proposal. This might have to go down Saddie Hawkins style."

"What's Saddie Hawkins style?" Enid asks.

"Saddie Hawkins was a dance," Carol explains to her. "In the old world, at schools. The girls asked the boys."

"Your school didn't have one?" Shannon asks.

Enid shrugs. "I never made it past 8th grade."

"I'm not asking Gunther to marry me," Dianne says. "That's not how that works."

"I never pegged you for a traditional kind of woman," Carol admits.

"Just because I'm a knight doesn't mean I don't want to be romanced like a lady."

"Sounds like you _were_ romanced like a lady last night," Shannon says. "Look, I've known Gunther for five years. My husband's known him for seven. He's a little gun shy when it comes to women, after what he went through with his first wife and his…uh…last girlfriend. That's all. He may not put himself out there again. Not like that. But he loves you. That much is as plain as a neon sign."

Dianne's clearly uncomfortable with her own admissions, and says, "Enough about me. Who are you hooking up with this year Rosita?"

"Maybe Lieutenant Alvarado if Michonne's done with him."

Enid lets out an "Ooooh."

Tara shakes her head. " I would _not_ cross Michonne if I were you."

"I said _if_ Michonne's done with him. And _only_ if. She's been vague about him."

Carol has the mason jar now. She circles it and watches the liquid ripple and thinks about that skin mask Daryl found. She looks up at Dianne, and thinks it can't be too big a deal, if the woman is more worried about absent proposals than whatever freaks might have made that thing.

[*]

Aaron is the first Alexandrian to ride through the front gate of Oceanside the next morning, with Gracie between his legs. When he dismounts, Daryl offers him a manly handshake, and Aaron jerks him forward into a back slapping embrace. As he does so, Gracie runs off to join some Oceanside kids, and Aaron lets her go. Daryl doesn't ask about Jesus. He just says, "'M buyin' tonight, after the fair, at Henry's."

"Sounds like a good plan to me."

Cyndie, who has strolled forward to greet him, asks, "Are Michonne and Father Gabriel going to be here soon?"

"Michonne and the kids and the rest of our fairgoers are less than thirty minutes behind me. Gabe's not going to make it this year. He's in charge back home."

"Well, I want you and Michonne and Rosita at Henry's in an hour. We're having a meeting of the leaders."

" _Before_ the fair starts?" Aaron asks. "I thought we were going to do the big ticket trade haggling after – "

"- We are. But there's something else we have to address first. Welcome to Oceanside. It's good to have you."

When she walks on Aaron turns quizzically to Daryl. "What's all that about?"

"She's gonna 'splain why m'daughter found a mask made of dry walker face on the shore yesterday."

"What now?"

"Yeah. 'S what I said. Guess we'll know soon."

"Speaking of your daughter…I'd like to finally meet her. Gracie would, too."

Daryl jerks his head toward the cabins. "C'mon then."

[*]

When Daryl and Carol hear that Michonne is arriving, they head toward the gates of Oceanside. Lieutenant Alvarado is at the horses almost the moment rolls in. Judith jumps straight off the back of the cart and then helps her little brother RJ down. The Lieutenant offers her hand to help Michonne step down. He presses a tentative kiss to her cheek. She shifts her head and lets him kiss her lips.

Alvarado smiles. "So, not tired of me yet?"

"Not just yet," Michonne teases.

Judith, who has come around from the back of the cart, looks up at the lieutenant with a somewhat sour expression on her face.

"You want one to?" The lieutenant squats down, kisses her on the cheek, and Judith rears back.

"Ewww!" she wipes her cheek clean to the sound of Michonne's low chuckle. "Only Uncle Daryl gets to do that," Judith insists, and runs to Daryl on the docks, but comes to a tapered stop when she sees Sweetheart in his arms. "That's your kid?"

"'S my kid," Daryl agrees, and lets Sweetheart down.

Judith regards her warily for a moment. She's been the apple of her Uncle Daryl's eye for so long, she's clearly not sure about this interloper. But then she declares, "Okay. She's cute." She holds out her hand to the toddler. "Come on, kid. I'll show you the ropes."

Sweetheart peers suspiciously at Judith's outstretched hand, but then puts her own hand in the other girl's. "Wopes!"


	206. Chapter 206

In the morning, the leaders of the communities – at least those who have arrived for the fair - gather around the longest table on the floor of Henry's pub. Daryl leans back against a nearby table, half-sitting on its surface, to listen, even though he isn't a Jamestown council member. Henry lingers, too, to clean up after his pub's big night last night. No one tells either one to leave.

"Fourteen days ago," Cyndie begins, "shortly after the mailboat and pony express both left – which is why your communities haven't heard about this yet – a group of us went hunting. Me, Dianne, Kathy, Leah, a few others. While we were out tracking a wild sow, we came across a group of walkers. At least, we _thought_ they were all walkers. But when Leah got ready to drive her harpoon into one, it ducked, drew a knife, and stabbed her."

On Jamestown's side of the table, a surprised gasp goes up from Linda. There's confused blinking from Carolyn, a dumbfounded expression on Captain McBride's face, and wide eyes from Gunther, but Carol's first question is: "Did she survive?"

Cyndie solemnly shakes her head. "Our doctor tried stitching her up, but the wound was too deep. It became infected, and we buried her eight days ago."

"Our condolences," Gunther says. "It's a blow to lose one of your community. We've suffered a similar loss recently."

"Why did you think they were walkers?" Michonne asks from one end of the table, where she sits flanked by Aaron and Rosita. Around the opposite end of the table sit Jesus, Tara, and Enid.

"'Cause they wore walker masks," Daryl says. He reaches behind himself and holds up the mask he found on the shore.

Michonne's brow furrows in disgust.

"They walked like them, too," Cyndie continues. "And they walked _with_ them. The people were mixed in with the herd."

"So it was a misunderstanding?" Aaron asks. "You tried to kill one of theirs, thinking he was a walker, and they reacted by stabbing Leah?"

"It wasn't a misunderstanding," Dianne says. "They were deliberately trying to draw us in and then take us by surprise. I think they didn't expect us to have so much ammunition on us. But we had two semiautomatic rifles, with ten rounds in each magazine. We don't use rifles to hunt, typically, but we bring them for security, just in case."

"Why did they want to attack you?" Carol asks. "Just to loot?"

"No," Rachel answers. "They're territorial. Apparently they were pissed off our hunters had crossed into _their_ borders."

"You went through their gates?" Jesus asks. "Uninvited?"

"You wouldn't know anything about that now, would you?" Aaron asks. "Gates _and_ bedrooms."

Michonne, who's had Jesus uninvited in her bedroom, chuckles, but she also whispers something to Aaron. She's probably telling him to keep his personal issues with Jesus off the council table, Carol thinks.

"No," Dianne answers. "They didn't have any gates or fences. They just had a territory they considered to be theirs. It wasn't marked by anything but their imagination."

"There was scuffle," Cyndie continues. "After Leah was stabbed, another one of the seeming walkers drew out a sawed-off shotgun, and Kathy and I opened fire."

"Was anyone else hurt?" Carol asks, looking at Cyndie's advisor Kathy. The woman was limping into the pub earlier.

"The Skin shot my foot," Kathy replies. "She was aiming for my chest, but Dianne shot an arrow through her neck while she was firing and she missed. Some shrapnel made it through my boot. The doctor spent hours picking it out, but I'll be fine. It might be awhile before I can walk well, but I'll live."

"We plowed down fourteen of them before the last one fell on her knees with her hands on her head to surrender," Cyndie says. "And that's when we put up our weapons."

"We took the one who surrendered prisoner," Dianne continues. "I interrogated her."

"That's a frightening prospect," Gunther says with a slight smile. "I suppose she caved easily?"

"No. Not at all. But then Rachel got the idea that Henry should play bad cop good cop with me and befriend Lydia - the prisoner - since she's about his age. So we put Henry in our guard house with her under some trumped-up charges."

"Rachel hung me out like a piece of meat!" Henry calls from the bar where he's drying glasses.

"Well you _are_ a cute piece of meat," Rachel calls back.

Henry, smiling, shakes his head and resumes his work.

Carol observes that Daryl is looking at Rachel with startled admiration. It's the sort of idea _he_ would have thought of, and he's probably surprised Rachel did. Carol's surprised, too. Maybe her daughter-in-law is smarter than she's given her credit for.

"She told Henry things," Cyndie says. "Like that her mom was in charge of that group, and she was one of the ones we killed. And the second-in-charge was also killed. Four days after we captured her, and Henry started talking to her, Lydia agreed to lead us back to her mother's camp. It wasn't much of a camp. They had no shelter to speak of. They had this nasty open latrine. They must have lived like animals. Half of them had very recently gotten sick, probably from the lack of sanitation, and most of the camp was dying or dead when we got there. The few survivors had a pile of bodies of their own people they were starting to skin to make masks and…I guess…suits."

"Sweet Jesus!" McBride mutters.

"When Lydia told them Alpha and Beta were dead – "

"Who?" Carol interrupts Cyndie.

"It's what they called their first and second in command," Dianne explains. "They didn't use names with each other. Lydia's mother didn't even call her by name."

"When Lydia told them Alpha and Beta were dead," Cyndie continues, "the survivors fled from us."

"How many?" Carol asks. "Fled?"

"Seven," Cyndie answers. "They don't have any guns, at least. Lydia stayed. She threw herself on our mercy. And there was a baby. The mother, who was sick, had hidden it in the hollow of a tree, maybe to keep the others from killing it. They kill their young, if they become an inconvenience."

"Sweet Jesus!" McBride mutters again.

"Maybe the mother hoped to come back for it," Dianne suggests, "but she got too weak and died. When we found the baby, it was nearly dead, but we saved him. He's in the care of a wet nurse now."

"We've also taken Lydia in," Cyndie says. "But we were hoping the Hilltop might take her." She looks in the direction of Tara, Enid, and Jesus. "What with Aaron and Gracie having moved out, you have room in the mansion now."

At this, Aaron and Jesus lock eyes. Aaron's jaw grows tight and he looks down at the table.

"You have more free rooms than we do," Enid replies. "In your cabins."

"It's not about the space," Dianne explains, "this girl – "

"- She's not a girl!" Henry insists from the bar. "She's _my_ age."

"This _young woman_ ," Dianne says indulgently, "has suffered some serious PTSD."

"Haven't we all," Enid mutters.

"The way they lived was traumatic enough," Dianne insists, "but she also clearly grew up under an abusive mother's heel."

Daryl makes a low growl in his throat.

"You have that woman who used to be a clinical psychologist at the Hilltop," Dianne continues. "Maybe she can help Lydia. But more to the point, it's not a good idea for Lydia to be _here_. Her people killed Leah. She's not exactly embraced by Oceanside. But she could have a new start at the Hilltop, where there isn't so much resentment against her."

"But can we _trust_ her?" Jesus asks.

"I thought you believed trust should be freely given until it's broken?" Aaron replies from the other side of the table.

Jesus catches his eyes and then looks away.

"I don't know," Cyndie answers honestly. "But she has no power to threaten anyone. She can't be more than seventeen, and she's unarmed."

The three rulers of the Hilltop bend heads together. When they sit straight again, Tara says, "We'll take her in, but if there's any trouble – "

"- Of course," Cyndie interrupts her. "We leave that to your discretion."

"This whole story will be more interesting when Erin tells it at the storytelling contest, tonight," Rachel says. "Trust me."

"Well, I'm not exactly bored _now_ ," Gunther says. "Anyone else? Bored?"

"Not at all bored," Captain McBride agrees, his usually subdued Scottish brogue slipping out slightly in his excitement. "This is mibay the most mental thing I've heard since I heard the dead were lunting about."

"They really wore cannibal skins?" Linda asks.

Daryl draws the mask to his nose and sniffs. "Don't get it. Get it works when you smear their fresh guts all over ya – but those stink of walker. 'N when the rain comes 'n starts to wash the guts away, the walkers smell ya. This don't smell enough like walker. 'S like a dried hide. So how's it fool the walkers?"

"What's this about smearing guts all over yourself?" Linda asks.

"We did that a couple times," Carol explains. "To get out of some jams. I wouldn't recommend it as a _regular_ practice. And like Daryl says, when the rain came, and the guts started to run off, the walkers began to smell us. So how do they get away with these dried skins?"

"It seems to work," Cyndie answers. "Maybe they freshen them up periodically. Dab them with fresh guts or something."

"Like perfume?" Rachel asks.

"Obsession by Calvin Klein," Henry says from the bar, and Rachel snorts. Carol's surprised Henry would remember those old ads. He was only seven when the apocalypse started.

"If this really _works,"_ Linda says, "we could sew coats and jackets and ponchos out of cannibal hides for people to wear when they go outside the gates."

Gunther glances down the table to her. "Linda, old friend, I know you're a business guru, but are you really thinking of starting a cannibal-skin clothing industry?"

Linda shrugs. "I supply the needs and wants of people."

"Well I don't think anyone _wants_ to wear a cannibal skin," Carolyn says, crinkling her nose. "But as a practical matter, I suppose it's worth investigating, to see how well it really works, and, if it does, the Council could order a few…" She crinkles her face in disgust, "clothing items...be prepared and kept accessible for travel."

"Oh, it works," Cyndie assures her. "They walked among them and herded them and corralled them like sheep."

"Why?" Gunther asks.

"To use them as a biological weapon," Dianne tells him. "Which is what really brings us to this table. We need your help."

"My help?" Gunther asks.

"The help of Jamestown," Cyndie explains. "And the Hilltop and Alexandria. She leans forward on the table. "There's a horde of walkers, hundreds of them, currently corralled in the storm stewers beneath the streets of a little beach town three miles southwest of Oceanside, _on_ our peninsula. According to Lydia, the Skins led them in there and were keeping them there to release against us if we trespassed again after our first warning. Leah's death was supposed to be our first warning. They were planning to kill one of us, capture another, and disappear. Then they were going to bring the prisoner back, exchange her for supplies, and warn us not to cross their borders again. They weren't expecting to get shot up."

"Three miles from here?" Carol asks. It's far enough that the sounds from the fair shouldn't agitate them, but it's dangeorusly close in the long-term if they start migrating.

"That also puts the horde six miles northeast from Alexandria," Michonne says.

"And about eleven from the Hilltop," Jesus adds, " as the crow flies."

"And nowhere near Jamestown," Carolyn insists.

Dianne shoots her a peeved look.

Cyndie continues, "The horde is currently contained – the Skins had sealed off the entrances to the storm tunnels with iron gates, but we don't trust those gates to hold if they begin to push as a mass on one of them and if they continue to push for days. If they do that, _eventually_ , they _will_ break through. And _if_ they break through, they'll likely migrate toward us, or maybe toward Alexandria. We have two watchmen there now, to alert us if and when they begin to break through, but we'd like to clear out the entire horde before that ever happens. As a preventative measure. Now that's going to take a lot of walker-slayers and a lot of firepower. We can't kill them _all_ by knife and spear and bow. We were hoping you all would stay an extra day or two after the fair to deal with this horde, that you would lends us your best walker-slayers and some ammunition. I know Alexandria once solved the problem of a horde in a nearby quarry." She turns her attention to the captain. "And I understand the Jamestown navy eliminated several hordes in the early days of its existence."

"Yes," McBride replies, "But I don't really see what this has to do with Jamestown."

Cyndie's mouth opens in slight disbelief. "You don't?"

"It's not a threat to us."

"It's a threat to your _allies_ ," she says. "To your – "

"- To my what?" He lets out a puff of air that is possibly a laugh. "To my _what_ , Cyndie? I have no idea _what_ ," he waves his hand from herself to himself, " _this_ is. Because you won't _tell_ me."

Apparently Aaron and Jesus aren't the only couple with personal grievances at this table, Carol thinks. Something must have fizzled after Captain McBride's merry greeting of Cyndie yesterday. Or simmered.

"This is neither the time nor the place for that discussion," Cyndie says coolly. "We have a treaty. A binding treaty, written on paper, signed by the representatives of _your_ council."

"A treaty that says Jamestown will supply guns and ammunition at a steep discount," Carolyn says, "if one of our allies is threatened. Not that we'll supply _manpower_. And it's not even clear to me that anyone _is_ being threatened."

"It's not a threat today," Dianne says, "but it _will_ be in time."

"Couldn't you further block off the entrances?" Linda asks. "With boulders or something?"

"How would we move the boulders?" Cyndie replies. "We don't have working construction equipment."

"Felling trees, then?" Gunther suggests.

"Walkers can crawl over trees," Dianne says. "We could tack boards over the exits, maybe, pile up forest debris, but that just delays the push through by a few days or weeks."

"And even if they couldn't break out on their own," Cyndie says, "those Skins who fled probably know how to lead them. What if they eventually seek revenge and go and let those walkers out and lead them in our direction? We can't keep watchmen on post there _forever_."

"Do you really think it's necessary to clear out this horde?" Gunther asks Dianne across the table. "For Oceanside's security?"

"I do."

"I haven't done much walker slaying lately," Gunther admits. "I've been inside the gates of Jamestown for years. But I can certainly aim a rifle, and I brought one. And I brought sixty rounds of personal ammo with me for trade."

Dianne blinks in surprise. "Sixty?"

"You know I work a lot. I rarely spend it now that I've stopped drinking."

"You'll help?" Dianne asks.

"I'll help."

"This is a council decision," Carolyn insists. "This is not your call, Gunther."

"It's my call what I do with my own rifle and my own ammo and my own body!" Gunther insists.

"What if we create a worse problem trying to destroy them?" Carolyn asks. "We should just _leave_ them there."

"And leave a 24/7 watch there for years?" Cyndie asks. "It's not realistic. We should be rid of the threat. Ask yourselves whether you would want hundreds of walkers three miles from your doorstep. Three miles from the doorstep of your _children_."

"They do have a lot of children here, Carolyn," Captain McBride says. "Think of them."

" _Now_ you're on my side?" Cyndie asks with annoyance.

" _I_ was _always_ willing to help. I just don't see what it has to do with _Jamestown_. Of course _I'll_ help you. The only question is whether I would be justified in _ordering_ my sailors to help. And I don't feel I am. But I'll ask for willing volunteers among my men."

"We're in," Daryl mutters from behind Cyndie. "Me 'n Carol." He locks eyes with Carol, but he doesn't really need to ask. Of course she's willing to help, and maybe some small part of her is even thrilled at the prospect of slaying lots of walkers. God knows she could use the knife and bow practice. She nods.

"Well, I'm just a tavern owner," Linda says. "A bit over the hill. I don't know what I can do, but I've brought plenty of Jamestown shine, and if it will lend the men courage, then I'll offer a free shot to every volunteer cannibal-slayer."

"Here here!" Captain McBride cheers.

Carolyn shakes her head. "We have to vote if we're using communal property brought for trade."

"The shine I'm talking about is _mine_ ," Linda says. "Private inventory. It's not community property."

"No council approval is needed for anything we've suggested so far," Gunther tells Carolyn.

"If any of my men volunteer," McBride says, "they can use their own rifles and ammunition. Though I'd suggest the Council consider supplying them ammunition from the communal stores. They'd be more inclined to volunteer their time if they weren't also volunteering their money."

"We can pay you something for your time and ammunition," Cyndie says. "At a _discount_ , in accordance with the treaty. Wine, maybe?"

"Wine?" Henry asks from the hearth, where he's clearing used glasses off the mantle onto a tray. "That's supposed to be for my – "

"- We'll work it out," Cyndie interrupts, and Henry sullenly returns his tray of dirty glasses to a soapy tub of water on the bar. Cyndie looks to both ends of the table as she asks, "What about you, Hilltop? Alexandria?"

Michonne leans back casually against her chair and drapes one slender, dark arm over the back as she turns her body half toward Cyndie. "I'm in. I could probably benefit from getting out a little pent up energy."

"I've got a new arm blade attachment I wouldn't mind trying out," Aaron says. "I've only had to kill one walker since Hilltop's blacksmith made it."

"I could use the martial arts practice," Jesus says. "I'll be happy to kick in some heads."

"I'm in," Tara says. "But I'd really rather Enid stay back. She's our doctor."

"Seriously?" Enid asks. "I can fight."

"I never said you couldn't. I'd rather you not. Besides, one of us should get back to the Hilltop right after the fair. Alden's a good guy, and all, but I don't like leaving the place in his hands for too long."

"Fine," Enid mutters.

"I'm all for wiring some homemade explosives," Rosita volunteers. "Let's see how many we can blow up first before we have to take them out one by one."

"It might be better to funnel them out," Carol suggests. "Control their exit to give us time to kill them rather than to use explosives that might blow both ends of the tunnel open. It would kill some, but the rest would flood out every which way. It would be chaos."

"Then we can blow it up halfway through, maybe, after we've controlled the funnel for a while," Rosita suggests.

"You really just like to blow things up, don't you?" Michonne asks.

"It's economical."

"It's dangerous," Michonne says. "And hard to control. I'm with Carol on this one. Explosives might have their place, but lets not just blow those tunnels wide open to start."

The group discusses the issue a little longer, until it's time for the fair to open, and then they agree to meet again the following morning to finalize their plans. They dissolve to attend the annual celebration of community and trade and life, excited about the fair, but even more about the horde.


	207. Chapter 207

As the leaders head down to the fairgrounds from the pub, Daryl falls behind to talk to Cyndie and Carol falls in place somewhere beside Rosita. "I do hope you were joking last night about hooking up with someone at the fair."

"Lieutenant Alvarado?" Rosita asks. "Of course I was. Even if Michonne _was_ done with him, I think there's some kind of rule about friends an exes."

"I meant _anyone_ ," Carol says a bit more pointedly. "Earl? Remember? Is that not serious?" That poor man's already been through his wife cheating on him.

"Relax. I'm not planning to hook up with anyone. But, hey, by all means judge my relationships as well as my explosive skills."

"No one's judging your explosive skills," Carol insists. "I just think it would be better to control the flow of walkers."

Michonne draws up beside them now, a finger draped casually through the belt loop of her tight jeans. Carol doesn't know how she moves freely in those to slay walkers, but she manages. "What's this I hear about you hooking up with Lieutenant Alvarado?"

"It was a joke," Rosita insists. "But would you actually care? Inquiring minds want to know. I bet _he_ wants to know."

"Carlos knows what this is," Michonne replies. "I've been very clear with him. And I don't think he wants to live in Rick's shadow anyway. But it's fun, a few times a year. If he manages to find someone in the meantime, I'll be happy for him."

"What if he hooked up with someone from Oceanside _today_?" Rosita asks. "It wouldn't bother you?"

"A little," Michonne admits. "Because I'm horny as hell today."

Rosita laughs. "I'm sure there are plenty of sailors who would oblige you if you didn't have access to the lieutenant."

"Yeah," Michonne flashes her bright smile, "but I like the lieutenant best."

She falls silent because now Daryl has rejoined Carol. "Think we should send Sweetheart back tomorrow 'fore we do this," he tells her. "On that speedboat, with Shannon 'n Gary, too. Garland's gonna blow a fuse if that ship don't show up when it's 'sposed to, with his wife and kid out here."

Daryl's right. Especially after that pirate attack, a delayed ship will have all of Jamestown worried. The speedboat can bring news ahead of the slow-sailing ship.

"Rachel can drive it, right?" Daryl asks. "Think her and Henry will take 'em? Cyndie says 's okay if we use it, long as we bring letters to Jamestown and bring it back in a week with mail."

"I'll ask them. I'm sure they will." If Henry accompanies them on the speedboat, he won't be able to join them to fight the horde, but she'd rather have him protecting Sweetheart. Rachel's seven month's pregnant and shouldn't be anywhere near that horde anyway. Maybe the bounce and jolt of a speedboat isn't the best idea for her, either, but she always on that fishing boat, and it will give her something to do so she doesn't feel left out of the whole adventure. Carol gets the impression Rachel needs to feel important to her community. And delivering news and children, if not exactly exciting, is certainly important. "Think Sweetheart will be afraid of the speedboat? How fast it goes?"

"Nah. Think she'll _love_ it."

[*]

The trade fair unfolds with merriment and haggling. There are booths with wares, food, and games. Judith shows Sweetheart the "wopes," leading her to various game booths, with Carol and Daryl in amused tow to watch the toddler's excitement. Most of the games she's frankly too little to play, but Judith helps her to fish in a barrel, and she wins a rubber duck, which she carries with her like a prized possession.

Eugene is in the dunking booth. Sweetheart's toss of the ball comes nowhere near the lever, but Judith shows her how it's done, and after the older girl's second throw, Eugene splashes into the tank and comes up sputtering.

"How's Candy?" Carol asks him as he smooths back his wet hair.

"A-okay," he answers. "But she's with child, as you know, and so she's stayed in Alexandria to get a little RT on the DL."

"What?" Daryl grunts.

"I think he means rest time on the down low," Carol says.

"Precisely," Eugene agrees. "I've brought copious quantities of her own personal brand of moonshine." He points to the table not far from the dunking booth, where mason jars full of clear liquid rest. "Prices are posted, and you can leave payment in the boxes under the table. On your honor."

"We'll get a small jar," Carol assures him. "She's adjusting well to Alexandria?"

"Like a fish to water," Eugene assures her.

Daryl nudges Carol and she sees that Sweetheart has disappeared. A quick search reveals her toddling toward the fortune teller, who sits in a chair with a small table before her. The table holds a deck of tarot cards, a crystal snowball, and a sign that advertises palm reading as well. The fortune teller, an Oceanside grandmother, is draped in a purple silk robe and wears a turban of sorts on her head. Judith catches up with the toddler and holds back her hands when she tries to jerk the purple tablecloth off the table.

When Daryl and Carol catch up, the fortune teller asks Daryl if he'd like to have his daughter's palm read. "Just one round of ammo."

"Pffft. Nah."

Daryl's not much for superstition, or maybe he _is_ , Carol thinks, because fortune tellers make him strangely uneasy.

"Yours then?" she asks Carol.

They brought a lot of ammunition for trade, but they weren't expecting to have to slay a horde tomorrow. She's being sparing in her purchases. "I don't think so."

"Coffee beans then?" the woman asks.

"Ain't payin' someone to bullshit me," Daryl mutters.

"Read me!" Judith insists, and fishes into the front pocket of her checkered button-down shirt to hand the lady a round of .357, the kind of ammo that goes with Rick's old Colt Python. The gun's too heavy for the little girl to use – too much kickback – but Michonne lets her practice holding it and dry firing it and has even let her shoot a real round a couple times at a target. The first time she tried it, Judith hit herself in the face with the gun after the kickback, and it left a mean red mark.

"Wead me!" Sweetheart echoes and bounces in place.

"How about I read you both for the price of one?" the fortune teller asks, smiling at Sweetheart as she drops the round of ammo into a metal cash box.

Daryl shifts uneasily. "She don't need a palm readin'. Ain't even two."

"That's the best time to read them," the woman insists, and takes Sweetheart's hand – the one that's not clutching the yellow rubber duck - and turns it over. She runs a finger along the lines of her flesh and Sweetheart giggles.

"Does that tickle?" Judith asks her.

"Twiggle!" Sweetheart echoes.

"This is the life line," the fortune teller says, tracing the line across Sweetheart's palm. Beside Carol, Daryl tenses. She can almost feel his muscles tightening. "And it indicates a very long life." Daryl relaxes. "This is the heart line…" The old Oceanside woman's fingertip runs over the line. "See these breaks in the line? These ruptures indicate heartache, struggle, false starts…a difficult quest for love." Daryl tenses again. Great, Carol thinks. He's already not thrilled with the idea that Sweetheart might one day date. Now he's going to be an absolute guard dog when it comes to her romantic interests.

"Just makin' shit up," Daryl mutters in Carol's ear, and he sounds like he's reassuring himself.

"But see how the heart line curves here with a happy flourish, almost back in on itself?" The palm reader asks. "After all the longing and heartbreak and uncertain starts, you will discover your true soul mate, closer at hand than you ever expected, and you will enter into a quiet love. You'll live your longest and best years together. This is the fate line. It's surprisingly shallow. This suggests you will have a great deal of influence in determining your own fa –"

Sweetheart jerks her hand back. "All gone!" That's what she says when she's done eating.

"Determinin' 'er own fate a'right," Daryl says a little proudly.

"My turn," Judith insists and turns her hand over for the woman.

The woman runs her wrinkled fingertip over Judith's lifeline, hesitates, and frowns. "You _will_ survive into adulthood," is as much as she'll say, and Daryl tenses again. She goes to the heart line next. "You will have a great, but short-lived passion in your life."

"Like my parents?" Judith asks. She's talking about Rick and Michonne, of course, who had too little time together in this world.

"That passion will burn like a flame, and you will have to be careful not to let it consume you."

"Pfft," Judith says, and she sounds a bit like Daryl when she does. "Not a problem. No guy's _that_ worth it."

The fortune teller smiles lightly. "This is the fate line. You will one day be a hero to your people."

"Hey, no pressure," Judith pipes with a shrug. Carol and Daryl catch eyes and snort.

"Your head line is deep and thin. This indicates you're smart, but sometimes a little too smart for your own good."

"That's what my mom tells me."

"Think yer mama's talkin' 'bout ya bein' a smart _ass_ ," Daryl tells Judith. "Shouldn't give her so much lip. Ain't nobody can be _too smart_ , though. Don't listen to that bullshit."

The fortune teller glances at him but doesn't respond to his comment. Sweetheart turns to him and says, "Up, Dada, up!" Daryl lifts her up and settles her on his hip. She puts her mouth on the head of her rubber duck and begins to suck on it as she watches Judith finish her palm reading.

"Your head line is separated from your life line," the palm reader says, "which indicates a bold and extroverted character."

Carol raises an eyebrow. "Well, that's certainly accurate."

"Pfft," Daryl says. "Could of read that a mile away."

When the palm reading is done, they carry on with the fair. Judith splits off from them to rejoin Michonne and RJ, who are with Lieutenant Alvarado. Daryl and Carol buy Sweetheart a small cup of apple sauce as a treat, and then later a small popsicle made from freezing grape juice made with the Hilltop's grapes. Daryl and Carol eat grilled vegetables on a stick at one of Alexandria's booths and pork rinds at Jamestown's.

The kids' sack races take place after lunch. Sweetheart's too little to make sense of it, and she ends up playing peekaboo with Carol using one of the sacks as the racers hop at the whistle. To everyone's surprise – except maybe the Dixons – it's Gary who take first place, just barely overcoming Judith. Gary's the youngest child competing – younger even than RJ – but he's the most energetic by far.

[*]

Carol sits Sweetheart down on a rock on the beach when it's time to watch the crossbow competition. Daryl doesn't usually have much competition, but a young man from Alexandria is doing surprisingly well after the first round – which means he's within thirty points of Daryl. Carol's pretty sure he was just a teenager when she saw him at the Kingdom's third and final fair. He looks like a real man now.

"He's only nineteen," Michonne whispers to her. "I had to remind myself."

"Nineteen's legal," Carol says with a smirk.

"Not legal to have a _real_ conversation with, though."

Carol glances at Lieutenant Alvarado, who, with RJ perched on his shoulders, has walked over to talk with Captain McBride on the other side of the range. Judith is off somewhere in the village with a gaggle of friends, including Hershel and Gary, still playing kids' games. "Is the lieutenant a good conversationalist?" Carol teases.

"Let's just say he makes good use of his tongue."

Carol chuckles.

Sweetheart is amusing herself by smashing her rubber duck's head into its body with her fist and then watching it slowly reformulate itself.

"Hey, watch," Carol tells her. "Daddy's about to shoot."

Sweetheart gasps, looks up from her duck at the archers, and shouts, "Dada, Suit!" The cheer must distract him, because his arrow only makes it into the second circle outside the bullseye. His next shot, however, is right in the center again.

The young man from Alexandria takes the silver. After Daryl's done collecting arrows from his target, he strolls over and shakes the young man's hand. They end up swapping and looking over each other's weapons, and Carol's pretty sure he's lost him for awhile to crossbow talk.

"Boys and their toys," Michonne says with a roll of her eyes. "By the way, I was admiring the hilt of you knife there."

"Oh, well, you should see the blade then." Carol draws her knife from its sheath.

[*]

The competitions continue, one after another. Carol takes the silver in long bow, behind Dianne. She earns the gold at knife throwing, but she wonders if she would if Daryl competed instead of watching Sweetheart. There's staff, axe throwing, javelin, sword fighting, foot races, and martial arts sparring, too. The wrestling match is accompanied by the rough cheering of sailors. After two elimination rounds, the biggest and best square off - Jerry and Captain McBride. It's a rough, messy, and near-even grapple, but McBride finally relents and settles for the silver.

Toward the end of the evening, the Dixons settle on a wool blanket on the shore to watch the last event of the day – the horse races across the beach. Sweetheart, tugging on one earlobe, curls up and lays her head on Daryl's upper leg, exhausted from the events of the day, her little rubber ducky tucked affectionately in the crook of one arm. Carol sits on the other side of Daryl and rests her head on his shoulder.

Daryl drapes his left arm around Sweetheart and his right around Carol's waist. "I got me _two_ sleepy girls," he murmurs.

"I'm not sleepy," Carol insists. "Just comfortable."

"Take 'em down, Gunther!" Captain McBride shouts. He sits on a nearby log of driftwood, on the other side of their blanket. He's sitting very close to an Oceanside woman who _isn't_ Cyndie. Mallory, Carol thinks her name is. The woman's mildly attractive, in her forties, maybe ten years older than McBride. Perhaps he and Cyndie have called things off, because when the woman rests a hand on the captain's thigh, he doesn't brush it off.

The horses line up for the first heat not far from Carol and Daryl's blanket. A cocky former knight of the Kingdom – one who always annoyed Carol - makes fun of Gunther's straw farmer's hat as they stand by their horses and pull on their riding gloves. "What do you think you are with that?" he asks. "A _cowboy_?"

Gunther looks the younger man up and down. "Well, I _am_ a cowboy, _son_."

"Yeah? How so?" The knight makes a point of mounting his mare with a flourish.

Gunther mounts his own stallion in a far more business-like manner. He brought the horse at the Hilltop's request, to breed it with one of their mares. At the Annual Alliance Fair, even the horses get to have one-night stands. "I raise, breed, herd, and milk cows."

"Oh."

Gunther reaches forward and strokes the neck of his stallion. "The deputies found this poor fellow five years ago, tearing through a deserted field, fleeing walkers. They tranquilized him and brought him in, and when he woke up, I broke him. Didn't I, Baloo?"

The horse whinnies.

The knight scoffs. "You named your horse _Baloo_? Not very intimidating."

"Oh, I don't know," Aaron says from horseback beside him. "Pretty sure that Kipling bear could rip a man's head off."

"What's a Kipling bear?" the knight asks.

Aaron and Gunther exchange looks and chuckle. "Visit the Alexandrian library sometime," Aaron suggests.

The knight nods to Aaron's stub of an arm. Aaron hasn't bothered with a prosthetic for the horse race. He doesn't have one he can use to grip reins, anyway. Instead, his reigns are attached to a controlling device he's invented that he holds with one hand while maintaining his balance by steadily gripping his horse with his thighs. "You just race for fun, I guess?" the knight asks.

"Oh, I race to win," Aaron replies. "Just like everyone else."

Before the former knight can talk anymore trash, the whistle sounds and the horses are off. Carol is glad to see Gunther leave the knight in the dust, and even gladder to see Aaron eke him out by a nose. The two winners of each heat move onto the second round, which means the cocky knight is already out of the running.

After three heats, there are six first and second place winners ready to compete in one final race for the gold, silver, and bronze. That means Dianne and Gunther will now be squaring off for the first time this evening. Standing a few feet from Carol and Daryl's blanket, while the horses are tended to by groomsmen who give them drinks from pans and brush out their coats before the final race, Dianne takes a swig of her canteen and passes it to Gunther.

As he drinks, Dianne asks, "Care to make this interesting with a wager?"

The canteen slurps free from Gunther's mouth. "What sort of wager did you have in mind?"

Dianne shrugs. "If I lose, I have to marry you and move to Jamestown."

Gunther can't suppress his smile. "And if I lose?"

"You have to marry me and move to Oceanside."

Gunther's smile falters.

"Not a wager you're willing to make, is it?" Dianne's face forms that unreadable mask she's learned to perfect in these hard times. But her voice is more revealing. "I suppose the prize isn't worth the sacrifice of the move in your eyes?" She takes back the canteen from him and swigs a little angrily. Then she lowers it again.

Gunther reaches for the canteen and gently pries it from her hand. "I accept your wager," he says quietly as he holds her eyes and screws on the lid. He drops the canteen on the beach and then strolls over to mount his horse. Dianne, the left side of her stern mouth twitching into a smile, mounts her mare beside him.

"Bloody hell!" McBride mutters from his log. "Gunther damn well better win this race!" He glances at Carol. "If he doesn't, _I_ won't be the one to tell Garland we lost our farm manager at the fair."


	208. Chapter 208

The horses thunder across the gravely beach. They swerve, dodge, or leap driftwood and other washed-up debris along the way. At both the start and finish line, people stand or sit cheering with excitement. Dianne and Gunther quickly pull ahead of the other four finalists.

Dianne overtakes Gunther for a moment, but then he spurs his stallion forward and bends his body into the gallop. Their horses draw side by side. Gunther pulls ahead a full body length, until Dianne leans lower, whispers to her horse, and catches up.

Gunther's stallion and Dianne's mare are neck and neck for several yards, but a mere ten feet from the finish line, Dianne slips slightly in the saddle. Her horse falls back, and Gunther overtakes her by two heads.

Carol wonders, but can't be sure, if Dianne's slip was intentional. The knight may have thrown the race to Gunther, but both are such good riders, it's hard to know. No one ever will know, Carol supposes, except Dianne herself.

When the riders dismount on the other end of the beach, Dianne sweeps Gunther's straw hat from his head and kisses him passionately. It's not the sort of passion she's ever shown in public before, and some surprised Oceanside women whistle and laugh. So do the former knights of the Kingdom. When Dianne finally pulls away, Gunther gets down on one knee, fishes into the front pocket of his faded blue farmer's overalls, and pulls out the diamond ring he claimed he wasn't bringing. This time, Dianne accepts it.

As he slides it on her finer, cheers go up from the Jamestown spectators – hoots and hollers and clapping and whistling. But Cyndie, who is near the finish line, only crosses her arms solemnly over her chest. She knows she's about to lose her head of security and one of her most trusted advisors. Jamestown has won this race – not just another gold medal to add to their tally today, but a human resource, a new deputy or watchman or scout, perhaps, a soldier, a knight – and one very happy farm manager.

[*]

Daryl carries a sleeping Sweetheart against his shoulder, his arm tucked beneath her bottom, as he and Carol stroll through the quieting campgrounds. The sun sinks into the trees while leftover wares are boxed, tables folded, and games taken apart. Jamestown sailors and workmen and single Oceanside women are beginning to trail up the path to Henry's pub, while families with exhausted children are disappearing into cabins. Mitch sits atop a picnic table, his feet on a bench, his rifle across his lap, talking to a flirtatious Oceanside woman who probably hasn't figured out he's gay, as he runs a rag over the hand carved wood of the barrel. He waves to Daryl and Carol, who wave back.

Carol pauses at the score boards – four, free-standing school chalkboards with wheels on their wooden legs, which are illuminated by the bonfire in a nearby old metal barrel-shaped trashcan. Each chalkboard features a different community's results. Carol pauses to read them, because there were so many competitions, they couldn't watch them all. The cursive, chalk lettering is so pretty and crisp and clear that Carol thinks whoever put this together ought to have won a gold medal for handwriting.

She starts with Jamestown's scoreboard:

 **JAMESTOWN  
** **  
Gold medalists -  
**  
Daryl Dixon – crossbow  
Carol Dixon – knife throwing  
Mitch Robinson – long range rifle  
Gunther Hamilton – horseback racing  
Gary Barron – kids' sack racing  
Madam Linda Cartwright – original cocktail: Captain John Smith  
Shannon Baron – original sweet dish: Grandma's Strawberry Pie

"Wonder who got to judge all the drinks 'n food," Daryl mutters. "'Cause, hell, I'll volunteer next year."

"Is that Captain John Smith even better than Linda's Appletini?" Carol asks.

"Appletini's a girly drink."

Carol turns her head to him and flutters her eyelashes. "Well, I'm a girl."

He bites off his smile. "Stahp."

Carol glances over to Oceanside's board and sees Henry won the bronze for original cocktail for his Hurricane Henry drink, whatever that is. For Alexandria, Candy Porter won the silver for her Lemon Drop Candy Shine, which she sent with Eugene, pre-mixed and jarred. "It's weird," she says, "seeing Eugene's last name attached to hers. That must be a strange relationship. They have nothing in common."

"Sure they do. Both 're professional actors."

Carol snorts. "Stop. That's mean."

"Don't mean it to be mean. 'S just true. She's good at pretending to like men she don't, and he's good at pretendin' to know shit he don't. 'N both are good at survivin' by gettin' other folks to do shit for 'em."

"They're both shrewd," Carol agrees. "In their own way. You don't think she really likes him?"

"Think she don't dislike 'em. 'N after awhile…hell might even love 'em, you know, like…family."

Carol shakes her head. "I don't know how a woman manages to have sex with a man she doesn't like."

Daryl looks at her warily but stays silent.

"Oh God," she says, closing her eyes. "I did used to do that, didn't I? With Ed?" She opens her eyes again. "I'd forgotten somehow. It seems like another lifetime."

"Was another lifetime," Daryl insists.

"Well, Eugene's not abusive. And he's probably deliriously grateful Candy's with him. That can't be a terrible feeling for her."

She continues reading Jamestown's list of silver medalists:

 **Silver medalists –**

Carol Dixon – longbow  
Captain Arnold McBride – wrestling  
Lieutenant Carolos Alvarado – foot racing  
Ensign Merry Riggs – storytelling, "The Tale of the Mutiny of 7 NE"

Carol glances at the other boards to see who won the gold in storytelling. It was Oceanside's Erin, for "The Whispering Skins." It's hard to beat a tale of people who make masks out of walker skins and walk among them, she supposes. She continues reading the list:

Ensign Chandler Morgan – swimming, 500 meter  
Seaman Norman Lincoln – rope climbing  
Seaman Jeffrey Reedus – knot tying  
Garry Barron - 50-yard dash (kids under 7 category)  
Gunther Hamilton – pumpkin growing – weight: 22 pounds

Carol glances across the boards and sees Nabila took the gold for pumpkin growing for the Hilltop, with her pumpkin weighing in at 23.5 pounds, while a gardener from Alexandria took the bronze. All three of those monsters will likely be gutted, pureed, and canned tomorrow while the fighters are off gutting the walker horde.

Marcus Jones – fish line untangling – 65 seconds

Henry's wife Rachel won the gold for Oceanside for that one, untangling her line in just 55 seconds.

Jamestown Crew Team – head-to-head rowing

Much to the chagrin of the Jamestown sailors, the Oceanside women beat them at the rowing competition. Although both Hilltop and Alexandria also entered the race, those landlocked communities were far behind their waterside competitors.

There are also a few Jamestown silver medal winners who sent contest entries in, even though they couldn't make the journey themselves:

Dante Jones – hand-carved item: footstool  
Inola Jones – hand-woven item: blanket  
Mary Cudlitz – original poetry (kids 7-12 category), "Ballad of the Mutiny of 7 NE"  
Leon Holden - original art, (kids 7-12 category), "Portrait of Captain John Smith," charcoal  
Deputy Andrew Davies – original art, "Daryl Dixon, Hero of the Mutiny of 7 N.E.," pencil drawing

"You've won a silver," Carol tells him with a smirk.

"Least he didn't submit the one of you with the big tits."

"Well, he had to sketch a copy. Shannon wouldn't let him take the originals down from the museum wall. I guess my tits would have taken too long to handle."

Daryl drops his eyes to her chest. "'M happy to take the time to handle 'em."

Carol rolls her eyes. "Smooth, Dixon. Very smooth." But she can't help but smile. Carol reads on:

Mitch Robinson – original poetry, "Heartbreak"

"You never told me Mitch was a poet."

"'Cause he ain't."

"He won the silver in poetry."

"Huh."

"Alden won the gold for the Hilltop. Who would have thought an ex-Savior would be a poet?"

"Who the fuck has time to write poetry?"

Carol laughs and continues to read:

 **Jamestown Bronze Medal Winners-**

Lieutenant Carlos Alvarado – swordsmanship

The lieutenant competed against his own romantic interest in that category, but Michonne easily took the gold – as usual.

Junior Lieutenant Stephen Payton – martial arts, hand-to-hand

Jesus took the gold for Hilltop in that one, predictably, but Carol is proud to see that Henry won the silver for Oceanside. Her son also won the gold for the staff competition this year. He's becoming quite the martial artist. Morgan and Ezekiel's training has stuck, and he's begun to grow beyond it.

Mrs. Norma Gentry – original savory dish: Butcher's Prize Jerky

Captain Arnold McBride – axe throwing

Carol wonders if Dante would have been able to beat Jerry in the axe throwing category had he been able to come to the fair, or at least take the silver over that big Alexandrian construction worker who won it.

Gary Barron – original art (kids under 7 category), "Abstract Expressions," fingerpaint

"Pffft," Daryl scoffs. "Abstract Expressions. Is that the one where he got into the wild berry patch and squashed all them blackberries 'tween his fingers 'n then smeared 'em all over that paper bag to clean 'em off?"

"I liked his painting," Carol says. "It spoke to me. I'm sophisticated. I appreciate abstract art."

"Keep tellin' yerself that."

"You don't know me."

"Pfft."

Carol sees Judith has won the silver in the 7-12 category for her watercolor "Portrait of Rick Grimes." Judith also won gold in the under 12 martial arts forms category (for her katana form). Carol wonders how the Jamestown kids would have done in the many physical categories (from obstacle course and team relay race to horse shoe toss and kids' archery) if any children other than Gary and Sweetheart had come. Next year, after this safe and successful trip, the Council might be willing to send more kids – a special field trip for the upper school, perhaps, and a chance for those 7- to 12-year-olds to get to know some of the allies they'll be trading and working with – and possibly marrying - in the future, when they become the leaders of Jamestown.

"Jamestown cleaned up," Daryl says.

Other than the various kids' categories, the only thing Jamestown didn't medal in was javelin throwing. And the relay race, apparently. Carol's not sure how they managed to come in dead last at that. She didn't watch that one. Maybe Jamestown had trouble scrounging up five good runners willing to compete when they could be flirting with women instead. "It looks like we have to work on our javelin throwing skills, though."

"Pfft. Why? Ain't like we live on the African plains."

"Fair enough," Carol concedes. She walks on, aware Daryl is probably getting tired of holding Sweetheart. When they get to Dianne's cabin, Michonne is easing out of the second spare bedroom after tucking both kids into bed.

"Judith hasn't gone out this easily in years," she tells Carol as Daryl carries Sweetheart into their borrowed bedroom.

"Sweetheart's been asleep for the last hour," Carol says.

"Are you two in for the night?" Michonne asks.

"I am, but Daryl's going to meet Aaron for a drink at Henry's."

"Would you mind keeping an eye on my kids? Carlos invited me for a walk along the beach, and Gunther and Dianne are out. I think they're celebrating their engagement."

"A walk along the beach?" Carol asks skeptically.

Michonne smiles. "A leisurely stroll."

Carol chuckles. "Of course I will. It's easy to babysit when everyone's asleep." Carol wouldn't mind a little quiet reading by the fire tonight, after all the excitement, and before the greater excitement that awaits them tomorrow. "You enjoy your stroll with the lieutenant."


	209. Chapter 209

When Daryl walks into Henry's pub, he feels suddenly claustrophobic. There's not a spot at the bar and not a single free table. Half the tables have been pushed to the wall to create a dance floor, and two men and a woman have gathered in a corner to form a dance band with fiddle, guitar, and banjo. Dianne and Gunther are dancing like they're in their own world instead of just a few feet from a dozen other couples. Captain McBride is on the dance floor, but the woman pressing herself tightly against him isn't Cyndie. In fact, Cyndie's not in the pub, not as far as Daryl can see. She must be back at her cabin _without_ the captain. Not that that's any of his damn business.

"No smoking inside!" Henry yells at Seaman Reedus, who has just lit up. "Back porch only!"

"You got candles in here!" The sailor points up to the lit chandelier that dangles from the ceiling. Along with the fire in the brick hearth and an oil lamp on the table behind the bar next to the metal cash box, it's the only illumination for the pub. That's probably for the best. Any candles on the tables or free-standing candelabras are bound to get knocked over. "So you must have ventilation!"

"It's not about the ventilation," Henry calls back. "It's about the stench. Outside with the tobacco!"

"Or _what_ , kid? You'll sick your bouncer on me?"

"Hey, Jerry?" Henry calls. "A little help."

From a table in the corner opposite the band, Jerry stands up, his chair scraping back with a loud screech.

"Okay! Okay!" Seaman Reedus hastens toward the sliding glass door that leads out back.

At the bar, Aaron raises a hand – his only hand - in Daryl's direction. Daryl nods and weaves his way over. He's no stranger to bars – he went to plenty of biker bars with Merle – at least as dimly lit as this one – but they were never all that crowded. There was always plenty of room for a barroom brawl, and Merle almost always got into one.

Daryl squeezes between a sailor and Aaron at the bar. Aaron already has a half-finished pint of Jamestown brew resting before him.

"Hell ya doin'," Daryl mutters. "Told ya I was buyin'."

"This one was on the house. You can buy the next one." Aaron chugs his pint, slams it down, and calls, "Hey! Tavern keep! Refill!"

Henry, looking unamused by the joke, a little frantic, and clearly overwhelmed by the many customers, grabs Aaron's pint glass without a word.

"What I can I get you, handsome?" Madam Linda asks Daryl as she saunters up to his side of the bar. She was just serving someone on the other side.

"Thanks for helpin' Henry out."

"Oh, he's paying me. But remember - anyone who's fighting the horde tomorrow gets one shot of Jamestown shine or one pint of Jamestown brew, on _me_."

"Take the brew," Daryl says. "'N a shot of Candy shine on the side." If he doesn't order it now, he probably won't be able to get a bar tender's attention again. "'N put Aaron's pint on m'tab."

"Will do."

When Linda returns with the Candy shine – before Henry returns with Aaron's brew – Daryl shoots it. He needs it fast. This crowd is closing in on him. He hisses. It's white whiskey, strong as thunder, but strangely smooth. He pushes the empty shot glass back across the bar as Henry sets down Aaron's pint. A mere five seconds later, Linda is back with Daryl's pint.

"Fuckin' insane in here," Daryl mutters to Aaron.

Aaron jerks his head toward the sliding glass door that leads out back. "Let's go sit on the porch," he says over the sound of music and chatter. "There's almost no one out there."

Daryl grabs his pint of brew and follows Aaron out the sliding glass door. Aaron's right. There are seven folding tables on the back porch, but no one is sitting at them. There's a couple at left end of the deck – Seaman Lincoln and an Oceanside woman. The woman's leaning back against the rail, and the sailor has his hands down on either side of her as he nips at her neck and she giggles in encouragement. Seaman Reedus is standing at the opposite end of the deck, where he's trying to cajole an Oceanside woman into offering him a light for his cigarette. He leans his head forward, his cigarette between his teeth. She flicks a match, and as he bends his cigarette into it, she says, "I thought you sailors were always prepared."

His cigarette now caught, Seaman Reedus leans back and talks around it. "I just like the view when you're lighting it."

The woman rolls her eyes.

"Did you hear I won the gold in _knot tying_?"

"I'm not into that," the woman says coolly. She stubs out the last of her cigarette on the rail and saunters back toward the sliding glass door Daryl's about to close.

"Your loss, sweetheart," Seaman Reedus calls as Daryl slides the door shut behind her. The sailor turns his back to the door, leans over the rail of the deck, and exhales a cloud of smoke.

Aaron and Daryl sit down at a table as far away from the necking couple as they can get. The pub shakes with noise, and Daryl's glad that walker horde is three miles away, where they can't hear the sound. Oceanside will draw nearby stragglers tonight, though, no doubt. The community has dug a one-mile-long moat outside its front gate, on the land side of the peninsula. They've laid a covered bridge over the moat, with a gate on the far end that they lock up tightly when they aren't using the bridge so nothing can walk over. They have to clean their moat the way Jamestown cleans its fences. The women spear the walkers like fish, and if the bodies start to pile up, they drag them out with hooks. The Skins' horde, however, would quickly pile up in the moat, the first five dozen forming a bridge that the next several hundred would walk right over.

Daryl's glad when the necking couple parts at the rail. The sailor takes the woman's hand and tugs, and, smiling, she follows him around the deck and toward the path that leads back to the cabins. Seaman Reedus throws them a jealous glance and returns to his cigarette.

"Well, at least _someone's_ getting laid tonight," Aaron mutters.

Carol told Daryl Aaron was going to need someone to talk to about the breakup. He supposes Carol meant that someone was supposed to be _him_. But he doesn't know what the hell to say about it. "Gettin' laid's overrated," he ventures.

Aaron draws his pint glass closer to himself. "Does Carol know you feel that way?"

"Meant with strangers." Daryl winces. That wasn't helpful. Jesus was no stranger. "Shit, man, dunno what to say. The fuck happened?"

"With Jesus, you mean?" Aaron sighs. "If I knew that, I think it would be a lot easier."

"Well _somethin'_ happened."

Aaron takes a sip of his brew and then sets it down. "I got a little jealous."

"Who the hell of?" Daryl doesn't know any other gay guys at Hilltop or Alexandria, not that he would know if they _were_. He doesn't pay much attention to that stuff. He didn't realize Mitch was attracted to him until Carol told him so. Aaron must have used the word _boyfriend_ a dozen times, but Daryl was still more than halfway through his spaghetti at Aaron and Eric's house in Alexandria before it really dawned on him those two were fucking each other. It's just not something he thinks about.

Aaron laughs slightly. "Well….that's where it gets kind of silly."

"Silly how?"

Aaron glances at the smoking sailor, who stubs out the last bit of his hand-rolled cigarette on the rail and then slips back into the pub. For a moment the laughter and chatter and live music inside grows terribly loud. The glass door slides shut and the sound recedes to a pulsing murmur again. "Tara."

"Tara! The fuck?"

"It sounds really stupid when I say it out loud like that."

"Yeah," Daryl agrees.

"It's just, in my past experience, some people will tell you they're gay when they're really kind of bi. Or at least bi for the right person. Anyway, Jesus and Tara were spending a lot of time together. A _lot_. I mean…a _lot_." He sighs. "So, you know, I _asked_. Are you interested in her? Are you attracted to her? And he got angry at me for not trusting him. And he's right. I should have trusted him. He didn't give me any reason not to trust him, but also…" Aaron shakes his head. "I don't know. I felt like I wasn't his best friend anymore. I felt like I hadn't been for a long time. For months. We just…drifted apart. I guess I wanted there to be a _reason_. A _someone_. _Anyone_. I didn't want to be losing him to no one. Because if I was losing him to no one, that would be like saying I'm not even better than nothing."

"Damn," Daryl mutters. He sips his beer because he doesn't know what to say. It hurt when Carol chose Ezekiel, but at least they weren't a couple then, and at least she chose someone who loved her, someone honorable. If she were to walk away _now_ because she just didn't _want_ him anymore? Not even because there was someone else she loved? "Fuck, man."

"So, yeah. That's what happened."

Daryl sets his pint glass back down on the table. "Jesus is a twat anyhow."

Aaron laughs. "A _twat_? That's not a word I'd expect to hear coming from you."

"He _is_ , man. Used to walk around without any weapons. Oooh….look at me. I'm a pacifist! So damn pure." Aaron snorts. "He stole me and Rick's truck full of supplies. Who the fuck does that? 'N then shows up in Rick's bedroom, unannounced, and checks out his naked girl?"

"I don't think Jesus was checking out Michonne. He was probably checking out Rick, though."

"Anyway," Daryl mutters. " _Twat_. He ain't yer type. Never knew why ya got together with 'em."

"You're just trying to make me feel better, aren't you? You don't actually despise Jesus, do you?"

"Nah. Course not. Think he'd have m' back in a fight. But he ain't the kind of guy I'd wanna sit down 'n have a beer with."

"Why not?"

"'Cause he's a twat."

Aaron laughs harder this time. "He's _not_ a twat." He picks up his beer. "Okay, maybe just a _little_ bit of a twat. Sometimes."

Daryl raises his glass. "To bein' rid of twats."

Aaron clinks his pint glass with his own, and they both sip.

The sliding glass door opens again, and Mitch comes out with a shot of white whiskey. He slides the door shut and leans back against it with a sigh. "It's crazy in there."

"This is m' huntin' partner, Mitch," Daryl tells Aaron.

Aaron nods. "Yeah, we met earlier. At the fair. He beat me at long range rifle. Which I probably shouldn't have wasted two bullets entering, but I thought, in prone position, with the mount…" Aaron shrugs.

"Hey, you got the bronze, though," Mitch says.

"Only because Carol and Rosita didn't compete."

"They should really have given you a handicap," Mitch says.

"The apocalypse doesn't hand out accommodations," Aaron replies. "Want to join us?"

"Ah…I don't want to be a third wheel. Don't want to interrupt anything."

"Well, Daryl and I were about to play tonsil hockey, but, other than that, you wouldn't be interrupting."

Mitch laughs, Daryl glowers, and Aaron pulls out one of the extra chairs at the table. Mitch sits down and sets his whiskey glass on the table.

"Candy shine?" Aaron asks.

"No. I took my free ounce of Jamestown shine. It's too bad it _wasn't_ the Candy shine that was free."

"So that means you're joining us to fight the horde tomorrow?" Aaron asks.

"Jesus talked me into it. He said you need marksmen."

Aaron's jaw grits at the mention of Jesus.

"Sorry," Mitch mutters, "I know you two used to…you were together, right?"

"We were."

"I know what that's like. I got dumped not that long ago. It gets better. So I'm told."

"Why'd she dump you?" Aaron asks.

" _He_. And…uh…I think I was just too old for him."

"You can't be more than thirty-five," Aaron insists.

Mitch smiles. "You flatter me. I'm in my forties. But more to the point, he was in his twenties."

As the conversation continues, Daryl gradually begins to get the impression that _Mitch_ is not the third wheel here. He quickly drains the last of his beer and stands. "Think 'em gonna head back 'n fuck m' wife. I'll take care of the tab on the way out."

As he slides open the door Mitch says to Aaron, "That's one hell of a way to exit."

"Quintessential Daryl," Aaron replies.

[*]

Carol's curled in the big papasan chair, reading a book by the fire, when he gets back to Dianne's cabin. She lowers her book. "You weren't gone very long," she says suspiciously.

"'S fine. We talked."

"You couldn't have talked much."

"Talked the right amount. Trust me. Was good." He walks over, takes the book out of her hand, bends down the corner of the page, and tosses it on an end table. He leans over her in the papasan, with his hand on the rim, and kisses her. "Wanna fool 'round?"

"With Sweetheart in our bed?"

"She ain't gonna wake up." He nips at her neck.

"What's made you so randy? Is there an aphrodisiac in the Candy shine?"

"How ya know I had Candy shine?"

"I can taste it on you." She kisses him. One of his hands slips from the rim of the papasan and onto her breast. He squeezes gently through her shirt and then slides half on top of her. She feels good beneath him. _Damn good_. He thrusts against her. She giggles.

"C'mon," he says. "Wanna make love to m' beautiful wife. Pretty please?"

"Well…since you asked so _nicely_ …I don't think Michonne's coming back tonight. Were Dianne and Gunther still at Henry's when you left?"

"Yeah."

"Then lock the front door."

"We're doin' it in the papasan?"

"Either that or you bend me over that end table. I'm game either way."

Daryl smiles. "Damn. I ain't the only one's horny."

"It's been a fun day."

"'Bout to get more fun," Daryl says, walking backward. He turns, strides quickly to the front door, and slams the latch closed.

They stumble to bed after their fun and go pretty quickly to sleep with Sweetheart sandwiched in the bed between them. Carol awakes to a loud rapping on the door. "Shit," she mutters. They forgot to unlock it again when they were done.

She pulls on her pants – she's still wearing her tank top – and hurries to unlock it. "Seriously?" Dianne asks. "Locking me out of my own cabin?"

"Sorry. It was an accident," Carol says.

Dianne laughs. She might be a little buzzed. Gunther puts a hand on the small of her back and ushers her inside. "See you in the morning," he tells Carol, and they've soon disappeared into Dianne's bedroom.

Daryl stirs awake when she crawls back into bed.

"We forgot to unlock the front door," she says.

"Shit," he mutters.

"It's okay. Dianne was buzzed."

"'M. Good."

"I hope we can fight this horde tomorrow with half our soldiers hung over."

"Ain't nobody can afford to get _too_ hung over. Not at Henry's prices for shine."

Carol chuckles. "It's good to hear he took Linda's advice, then." She slings an arm over Sweetheart, rests her hand on Daryl's hip, and fades back to sleep.


	210. Chapter 210

In the morning, when Carol talks to Shannon about sending her and the kids home on the speed boat, she replies, "You know Gary's just going to jump off that speed boat the first time he sees a frog in the water. I'm not sure it's the best plan, to be honest. But hey, you don't need Rachel. Marcus can drive it back."

Carol had forgotten about Jamestown's skipper and fisherman, who was the first to pilot the boat when they discovered it. He agrees to drive it to Jamestown with news of the delay of the _Susan Constant_. He'll bring an armed guard with him for protection – an Oceanside woman. They'll spend the night in Jamestown and return the boat to Oceanside the next morning with more letters, and then he'll sail home on the ship.

Meanwhile, Sweetheart will remain at Oceanside under the watchful eyes of Shannon and Nabila. She'll spend the day playing with Gary, Judith, RJ, Hershel, and Jerry's brood. This new plan means Henry can join them for the walker slaying. Judith wants to join the adventure, too, but Michonne says no. "I've killed walkers before!" the little girl whines.

"Yes, you have. In controlled conditions," Michonne reminds her.

"Well aren't these going to be controlled conditions?" Judith asks. "I thought you want to funnel them out!"

"You've been listening in, I see. But a mission like this is a little too dangerous at your age, Judith. _Next_ horde." Michonne winks. "I promise."

The team of walker slayers gathers with packs on their backs and weapons in their hands. They'll hike the three miles on foot, and by then, everyone who is a little hung over from last night's festivities should be wide awake. In addition to those who already committed to the mission at the Alliance Council Meeting, the team is joined by Mitch, Eugene, Jerry, Lieutenant Alvarado, Henry, two Oceanside soldiers, a Hilltop guard, and four Jamestown sailors who are beginning to regret accepting Madam Linda's free drinks.

Henry is at the front of the group, having walked ahead to do occasional forms with his staff along the way. Daryl and Carol walk somewhere toward the back. "Twenty-three people," Daryl murmurs. "Ain't bad. 'S that? Forty walkers a piece?"

"Depends how many walkers their turn out to be," Carol replies.

"How much ammo do we actually have, all together?" Cyndie asks Captain McBride from behind them. "We should do a count."

"Jamestown Navy!" calls McBride. "Sound off! Rounds accessible?"

"Fourteen, Captain," Lieutenant Alvarado calls. He's walking beside Michonne toward the front.

"Ten, Captain!" cries Ensign Merry Riggs.

"Eleven, Captain!" replies Seaman Norman Lincoln.

"Ten, Captain!" shouts Ensign Chandler Morgan

Seaman Jeffrey Reedus is last: "Nine, Captain!"

"Now I know you boys came with way more than that!" McBride bellows. "How much did you _spend_ last night?"

"Sorry, Captain!" Seaman Reedus cries from somewhere near the middle of the hiking pack. "These women are beautiful enough to make money fly _right_ out of a man's pocket!" The sailor steps a little faster until he's almost shoulder to shoulder with an Oceanside guard. From all the way back here, Carol can almost feel her rolling her eyes.

"I have fifteen rounds myself," McBride says in a more conversational tone. "So that's 69 for us." He lowers his voice still more to address Cyndie, but not low enough Carol can't still hear him. "Well not 69 for _us. Anymore_."

"I'll miss your crass humor, Captain," Cyndie replies. "I suppose Mallory will have that privilege now?"

"Mallory knows to strike while the iron is hot."

"The iron is always hot with you, though, isn't it?"

"Well, I'm a red-blooded man. But that's not what I meant. I'm thirty-seven. I'm not getting any younger. And the supply of women's not growing any larger, at least not soon enough to suit me."

"So because I'm not willing to settle down and move to Jamestown, you'll settle down with the first woman who throws herself your way?"

"Mallory wants a husband," McBride says softly. "She's not unattractive. And she seems sensible enough."

"Well, you sound madly in love," Cyndie says dryly.

"I don't _need_ to be madly in love. Mallory likes me. She misses being married. Frankly, so do I."

"You were married?" Cyndie asks in surprise. "In the old world?"

"See, these are precisely the kinds of conversations we don't have."

Cyndie falls silent, as if admitting the truth of the statement. Finally, she says, "You're really going to marry some woman you've dated less than twenty-four hours?"

"Not tomorrow. She'll come back on the ship to Jamestown, get a guest work visa, stay until the next mailboat. See if she likes the town, if she likes her work. See if she still likes _me_ by the end of the month."

"And then?" Cyndie asks.

"When the mailboat comes, she'll either go back to Oceanside on it…or she won't."

"Mallory's our best cook, you know."

"That virtue of hers had crossed my mind."

"You and Gunther, both," Cyndie mutters. "Robbing Oceanside of its talent. I never pegged you for such a pragmatist, Captain. I thought you were an adventurer."

"I suppose I am, but after sailing the high seas – or the low river as the case may be – and fighting pirates and hordes, I'd rather like a woman to come home to. Otherwise what am I fighting _for_?"

"I'm only twenty-six," Cyndie says, "I'm not in that kind of hurry to get married. And I have an entire community to run."

"I know. I'm sorry we want different things." He raises his voice again. "The rest of Jamestown? Rounds? Sound off!"

"I've got sixteen," Mitch calls from the row in front of Carol. "Because generous friends bought drinks last night." He puts a hand on Aaron's shoulder, for just a moment, and then takes it away. Jesus glances back from two rows up, looks the men up and down, and then returns his attention to the road.

The rest of Jamestown sounds off. Then Cyndie calls on Oceanside to give a count, Tara on the Hilltop, and Michonne on Alexandria. When all is said and done, they determine there are two hundred and twenty-eight rounds of ammunition available.

"We're going to have to do a lot of this killing the old-fashioned way," Carol says.

"Good thing I sharpened m'knives this mornin'," Daryl mutters.

[*]

The storm sewer tunnel runs beneath a three-lane roadway, the largest highway in town, and through two acres of woods on either side before emptying into a trickling creek with five-foot, sloping banks.

The two Oceanside guards Cyndie left to keep an eye on the tunnel meet up with them. The sailors perk up at the sight of new women who weren't at the fair.

"Did you see any of those Skins in the past 24 hours?" Cyndie asks.

"Yes," one of the guards answers. "The seven survivors of that camp came here yesterday afternoon. They were in their skin suits. They had keys to that padlock on the gate on the east side. They looked like they were getting ready to unlock it, probably to lead that horde toward Oceanside. So we made a call. We picked them off."

"Good decision," Cyndie assures them.

"Two got away, ran into the woods, but I don't think they're coming back. They probably thought we had an army hidden out here."

The group checks both sides of the tunnel. Several of the decaying creatures push against each of the two circular iron gates and stretch their rotting limbs through the black iron squares. Daryl climbs on top of the west tunnel, where another circular gate stretches across the top of a periscope-like cement structure. Standing on the cement edge, he looks down through the open metal squares at the teething mass below. Faces turn up at has scent and teeth gnash wildly. Arms claw the air, reaching within a foot of where he stands. He jumps back down off the top to the bank of the creek and then walks down to rejoin Carol. "Yeah. Walkers a'right."

She smiles and shakes her head.

Eugene measured the length from one end of the tunnel to the other as they hiked over the roadway, and now he's measuring the circumference of the mouth. His yellow, metal measuring tape is ripped down by walker fingers more than once, but he finally gets a read. He does the math, calculates the volume of the tunnel, and says, "It depends on how tightly they're packed all the way through there, but I'd estimate anywhere from 975 to 1,225 dead ones."

"That's oddly specific," Rosita says.

"It's a downright jamboree in there," Eugene intones.

They walk away from the tunnel, up the creek's bank, and back onto the highway above. The hum of the walkers beneath their feet can be heard all the way through the cement storm tunnels and the asphalt of the roadway. After a half hour of consultation and debate, they hatch a plan everyone can agree upon.

Henry will remain on the west side of the tunnel to attract at least some walkers to that side of the gate by running his staff against it, and thus slow the funnel out of the gate they plan to open. Seamen Reedus and Ensign Riggs will stay with him to thrust their knives into the foreheads of the walkers as they pile up against that gate.

On the east side of the tunnel, Rosita will lay a line of _light_ explosives outside the gate – not inside the center of the tunnel, and not a large amount, which might blow off both gates and create chaos. "Just the Goldilocks right amount," as Eugene says –enough to cave in some of the cement on the eastside mouth of the tunnel and pop the iron gate free. If their lucky, the explosing will also kill fifty or sixty walkers in the process.

The walkers will then flood out the open gate in the direction of the slayers. To make sure they do – and to make sure a few pause in the creek bed along the way – they'll leave chunks of wild boar in the creek bed. Oceanside killed a big one the day before last but found it contaminated with worms. So instead of roasting it, they stored it in a cool root cellar to keep as meat for walker traps.

Beyond that boar at a relatively safe distance will be a line of archers – Daryl with his crossbow, and Carol, Dianne, the Hilltop guard (a former Kingdom knight), and one of the Oceanside women with their longbows. When their arrows are spent, they'll drop their bows, draw knives, and run forward with the others who will also be attacking with melee weapons. In the meantime, marksmen, from a distance – on the bank of the creek and other perches around the perimeter – will cover the walker slayers, picking off walkers that begin to double up on any one person.

The ammunition is collected from all and given over to the six volunteering marksmen – Mitch, Rosita, Gunther, Captain McBride, and the two Oceanside guards who were left to watch the tunnel. For now, the extra, empty rifles are piled by a tree on the bank.

Cyndie glances at Captain McBride. "Are you _sure_ you can shoot that well?"

"I guess we haven't had that conversation either."

"It's just…you didn't enter the rifle contest either this year or last."

"I didn't want to waste two bullets."

"But you _can_ shoot well?"

Captain McBride raises his rifle where he stands on the shore of the creek bed, aims several yards away toward the iron gates, and shoots past Rosita who is setting up the explosives, straight through one of the iron squares, and into the forehead of a thrashing walker. It collapses.

"Hey!" Rosita yells. "Watch it! Women at work here!"

"You didn't need to waste a bullet to prove it," Cyndie insists.

"I rather felt like I did."

Cyndie looks at Jamestown's farm manager next. "You didn't enter the rifle contest either."

"I assure you I'll be of more use with a gun than with a knife," Gunther tells her. "I can't do all that fancy hand-to-hand combat the rest of you seem to enjoy. But I've been a farmer all my life. I can shoot. Do you want me to waste a round proving it?"

"No." Cyndie glances at Carol. "I know _you_ can shoot well. Are you sure you don't want to be one of the marksmen?"

"You don't have enough archers."

"After you drop the bow, you could grab a gun instead of a knife."

"I'm good with a knife, though. And six marksmen is _plenty_. We don't want too many bullets flying into that mess."

"Fair enough," Cyndie agrees. "Should we get this show on the road?"

[*]

Carol's boots are wet with murky creek water. The five archers stand with three feet between one another, spread apart across the narrow stream. The walkers, which have caught a whiff of all the people, are piling up on the gate now. Carol wonders how many Henry has managed to distract to his end, and how many he'll be able to keep drawing there once their gate is blown free.

She slides an arrow into her bow but doesn't pull back just yet. Beside her, Daryl lowers his crossbow and rests its butt on a rock in the creek so he can use both hands to cock it. She smiles slightly. She can't help it. She likes the way the muscles of his arms bulge when he does that. When he lifts the bow, he notices her smiling. "What?" he asks.

"Nothing."

"Got somethin' in m' teeth?"

Carol chuckles. "Like you would care if there was."

"Pfft." He raises his crossbow and aims toward the gate because Rosita has crouched down to light the long, powdered fuse that runs alongside the water, on the dry and cracked dirt shore, and curves into the makeshift dynamite that lies before the gate.

The black powder sparks. Rosita leaps up, turns, and runs like mad along the shore back toward the line of archers. The yellow-orange flame burns through the fuse. Six inches. A foot. Two feet. Three feet. Four feet. Six feet.

And then it peters out. _Nothing._

Rosita, breathing hard, stops running on the shore, puts her hands on her knees, and catches her breath. "Shit," she mutters. She sighs, stands straight, pulls out her matchbox, and begins to stroll forward again.

"Run fast after your light it!" Eugene calls from the long line of melee-weapon-clutching slayers that stand behind the archers. "It's only seven feet long now!"

"No shit, Sherlock."

When the fuse catches again, Rosita runs, jumps, plants one foot in the center of the bank, and grabs the outstretched hand of the awaiting Gunther, who jerks her up. They both run along the top of the bank toward the archers and fighters and pluck up their rifles, which are leaned against a tree. Carol pulls back on her string, as does Dianne to her left. Behind them, knives, swords, machetes, and other weapons are raised.

There's a sudden _Boom!_ Rocks, sticks, and dirt from the creek bed fly up in a cloud of dusty debris as cement crumbles around the edge of the tunnel. The iron gate pops off, careening through the air, and landing with a metallic clang against the rocks in the creek. Walker guts rain down from the explosion, and then the still-living dead begin to stream out.


	211. Chapter 211

A volley of arrows flies in the direction of the emerging hoard. The first five walkers crumple and fall, and the rest of the horde lurches over the bodies. Arrows whisk from quivers. Strings are pulled back, and another volley follows. Walkers drop in the creek bed, knees collapsing, legs folding like rag dolls. It's not long before the arrows are all spent.

The archers throw their bows to the ground. Carol slides her fingers into the brass knuckle rings of her knife and jerks it out. Dianne unsheaths her sword from the hilt on her back. Daryl rasps out a jagged knife in each hand.

Behind them, the other fighters ready their weapons. Michonne grips her katana and bends her elbows. Cyndie and two of the Oceanside women steady their spears and harpoons. Lieutenant Alvarado raises his saber. Jerry swings his battle axe forward into both hands, while Aaron bends his arm – with its mace-like attachment – in a battering position. Seaman Lincoln moves his feet like an agitate boxer as he grips his machete. Eugene drums his fingers nervously down on the handle of his knife. Ensign Morgan lowers his cutlass into a charging position.

"Advance!" Cyndie yells, and the fighters spill forward.

It's a chaotic sea of walker guts, of thrusts and jabs and slices, of dodging and panting and shouts of warning. Daryl is just pulling one of his knives out of a walker when he feels more closing in from behind. He whirls around as four of the hungry creatures lurch toward him. He stabs one. Another is taken down by Gunther, who lies in a prone position on the left bank of the creek. A third is dropped by McBride, who lies prone on the right bank, and the fourth by Mitch, who stands in the middle of a tree that has fallen across the river from bank to bank several yards away.

Daryl doesn't have time to sigh in relief. Two more walkers close in. He stretches out both arms simultaneously and sinks his twin blades into their foreheads. As he's jerking his knives back out, another walker comes straight at him. Jesus jumps into the air, whirls, and kicks the approaching walker in the head. He cuts through its brain with the thick, jagged metal spur attached to his left boot. _That's new_ , Daryl thinks for a moment, before stabbing his next walker.

Another walker draws up beside him, but before he can pull back his knife, it has its head splattered into a sea of black-blood by Jerry's battle axe. Jerry plows forward like a tank, onto the next walker and the next. Daryl stabs a walker in front of him, while the one to his left is decapitated by Michonne and the one to his right has its head sliced through from temple to neck by Lieutenant Alvarado.

Daryl has no idea where Carol is, but he also doesn't have time to worry about her. As he stabs a walker in front of him, he can feel another breathing down his neck. Before Daryl can turn to face it, Aaron brings his mace-hand attachment down on its rotting skull, and the guts splatter the back of Daryl's neck and vest. Two more walkers lunge for him. He dodges their advance, and the instant he's out of their path, Rosita takes them both down with a double pop from her AR-15. He whirls, weaves, and stabs again.

Daryl loses track of time, of motion, of smell, of sound, of everything. The slashing and dodging become routine, the pops of gunfire fade into the background, the smell of the walkers recede like a wave. There's an almost zen-like rhythm to the slaying after a while. The bodies pile up quickly, and the fighters keep backing up to allow the walkers more room to stumble out. Eventually, the horde slows to a mere trickle, like the creek itself.

Daryl's drawn suddenly from his slayer's trance when the screaming voice of Seaman Reedus pierces the air. Daryl looks up toward the sound. The sailor is running across the roadway that covers the tunnel. It's awhile before Daryl can make out his words: "It's snapped free! It's snapped free! The other gate has snapped free!"

Daryl scours the creek and the banks to locate Carol. She's just yanked her knife free from the desiccated skull of a walker. "Henry!" she yells. "Where's Henry?"

"It's snapped free!" Seaman Reedus cries again. "The other gate's snapped free!"

Carol runs up the bank. Walkers peel off after her from the creek bed. The marksmen take them down as they follow her. She scurries up the hill to the roadway, vaults over the bent metal guardrail on the shoulder, and flies across the asphalt, feet pounding, in the direction of the remainder of the horde, in the direction of her son.

Daryl, watching her run, doesn't notice the walker behind him until its bony hand has clamped down on his shoulder. For one brief second, he's sure he's dead, until Cyndie's harpoon slides through the monster ear-to-ear, and it crumbles behind him, its putrid hand running down his back all the way, like an evil caress.

[*]

Carol's heart pounds. She will _not_ lose another child. She _cannot_ lose another child. Why did she leave Henry to rattle their cage with his staff? Why didn't she consider the pressure might mount on that end and break the gate free?

She runs all the way across the road, vaults over the other guardrail, and reels to catch her balance at the top of the hill that slopes down to the tunnel and creek below. She screams in grief and horror at the sight of a dozen walkers on their knees in the brown creek water, heads bent, tearing and gnawing with hungry mouths, human flesh dangling from their teeth. "Nooooo!"

"Mom!"

Carol's head jerks in the direction of the cry, and she sees her son is not the one being feasted upon. He's escaped the horde by scaling the iron ladder on the side of the section of the tunnel that rises up like a periscope. He's balances himself atop the black iron grate that covers the vertical access point. Walkers fling themselves against the sides of the tunnel and reach lame hands and grope, but they can't climb.

Henry jabs at their fingers with his staff. He looks desperately in every direction, but there's no escape. Walkers are ahead of him at the mouth of the tunnel and to the left and right pressing in on both sides. He could try to jump down off the periscope protrusion onto the cement tunnel and run to where it disappears into the hill beneath the road, but then the walkers that press against it could seize him by an ankle and easily drag him down into their herd.

"Hold on, Henry!" Carol yells "Don't move from there!"

[*]

Daryl makes his way up the hill after Carol, who has long disappeared. Harpoon in hand, Cyndie runs after him. Captain McBride follows her.

Daryl finds Carol on the inside of the guardrail on the opposite side of the roadway, staring down at the scene below. A herd of walkers surrounds her trapped son, who pokes at their grasping fingers with his staff. At least they can't climb up there. They can't even reach him where he stands in the center.

Some walkers begin to peel off from the tunnel and climb up the gently sloping hill toward the scent of fresh human meat. They slip and slide on the way, some tumbling back down, but others remain on their feet. A few fall to their stomachs and continue the slow journey up in a sort of deathly army crawl.

"Come back," Daryl says. "Other side of the rail." He helps Carol over the guard rail and watches the walkers slither up the overgrown grass toward them. He draws his knife as one gets close, but it's not easy to bend over the rail to stab it. Cyndie shows up beside him now, out of breath, and stabs it with her long harpoon. It's head slumps into the grass.

On the other side of her, McBride stabs another walker with the bayonet on his rifle before his attention is drawn to the feasting walkers in the water. He looks over at Henry on the grate, and down again at the grisly dinner. "Oh God," he moans. "It's one of my boys. It's one of _mine_. Merry. Poor Merry!" He screams in rage, raises his rifle, and opens fire on the feasting walkers. He picks off seven before he's dry firing, which leaves space for more walkers to join the meal. He releases the empty magazine from his rifle, which clatters to the ground, unclips another from his belt, and slaps it into the gun.

"Stop!" Cyndie yells. "We need to conserve ammo and figure this out. We need to get Henry out of there. They can't reach him from there. He's safe for now. Let's just…the ones that make it up this hill, we need to keep stabbing them until we figure this out."

McBride sighs. "Always my men. Why is it always _mine_. This is the second sailor I've lost in a month. And always on other people's missions!"

"I'm sorry," Cyndie tells him. "I never meant for this to happen."

McBride grunts and then slides his bayonet into another walker that has clawed its way to the cusp of the hill.

Carol is practically hyperventilating as she watches Henry beat off the clawing hands at the edge of the grate. Daryl puts a hand gently on the small of her back. "Breathe. Breathe. 'S fine. Gonna be fine. Gonna clear 'em all out."

"There's so many!"

"Listen. Shh, listen. Almost done on the other side. Weren't many left. Gonna go back 'n collect our arrows, a'right? Get Dianne. Get yer bow. Get m'bow. Get 'Chonne and the lieutenant 'n anyone with a sword or a spear who can stab the ones that crawl up, 'n we'll shoot the rest from here. We got this. A'right?" He forces her to look in his eyes. "A'right?"

Carol nods numbly.

[*]

It's a slow process. Every re-collected arrow is spent a second time in a volley of arrows sent into the creek bed below. Slayers bend ungracefully over the guardrail to stab with spears, harpoons, bayonets, and swords as the walkers creep up one by one. When the herd is thinned out, Henry leaps from the tunnel and finishes off several with his staff as he makes his way up the hill, where Carol embraces him gratefully. The slayers spill down the hill at last to finish off the few remaining stragglers, collect their arrows, and examine the remains of Ensign Merry Riggs.

When they all meet back again on the roadway, Captain McBride holds Merry's blood-stained sailor's cap shakily in his hand. "There's nothing worth bringing home to bury," he mutters. "We'll have a memorial. We'll erect a cross in the cemetery in his honor." He lets out a long shaky sigh.

Cyndie puts a hand on his back, near his shoulder. "I'm so sorry," she says again.

"It's not your fault. We all knew the risks we were taking."

"Well," Seaman Reedus says. "At least Merry won't have to explain to Kaitlyn that he knocked that Oceanside woman up last year and has a baby now."

"Don't be an ass," McBride growls.

"Just trying to see the silver lining, Captain, sir. Sometimes you've got to laugh to keep from crying."

One of the Oceanside women, a former nurse, has brought a first aid kit and treats the minor scrapes and bruises obtained during the battle. Everyone is checked for bites. As the sun begins to set, the weary, dirtied, bloodied group begins it slow, tired hike down the roadway to find a safe place to camp, eat, and sleep for the night.

As they walk, Carol leans her head on Daryl's shoulder. He drapes an arm around her waist.


	212. Chapter 212

The indoor, glow-in-the-dark golf course still glows, after all these years, a surreal neon green, yellow, and orange. Perhaps the peaked, glass dome of the ceiling allows in enough sunlight to keep the chipped paint charged. The ceiling hasn't broken in after all these years, either, though there's a long thin crack in one panel, zigzagging from bottom to peak. This place was one of those old beach town attractions. For a mere $9 a game per person, a family could escape the heat or bad weather. That's what the horde-slaying team has done. It's pouring outside. They bathed in the torrent at first, happy to wash some of the walker blood and guts from their hands and faces and clothes, but now they're soaked and cold.

Captain McBride turns the crank round and round on a wind-up flashlight lantern until a stream of hazy white light floods out. Lieutenant Alvarado does the same with his. "Bunch of regular boy scouts," Daryl whispers to Carol, because it seems the Jamestown Navy is always prepared – except, they're never quite prepared to lose one of their own.

People strip out of their wet clothes without shame. It's hard to see too much detail in the hazy and glowing light. Soon, everyone is changed into the spare set of clothes they keep in their packs, and drenched clothes are hung out to dry over chairs at the tables in the snack shop.

Carol eases down on hole #6 and leans back against the base of a glowing green wooden spaceship. Henry sits down next to her on one side and Daryl on the other. Daryl stretches out his bootless feet. His fresh pair of dry, wool socks has a hole in the big toe. She'll have to mend that later, Carol thinks. He fishes in his pack for their dinner or dried fruit and deer jerky.

Others slide down at nearby holes. Mitch and Aaron rest back against a glowing orange rock, while Michonne and Lieutenant Alvarado slide down in front of a yellow and white windmill. Soon everyone is lounging on the artificial turf of holes #6 - #8, in a sort of haphazard circle, with a flashlight lantern in the middle sending up a smoky white light.

Aaron asks Mitch if he used up all his ammunition. This leads to a count off, and it's found that Oceanside's marksmen still have ten bullets remaining. Cyndie tells them to hand them over to Jamestown for payment for their services and as sad compensation for their loss. The women do.

Couples share food and camp blankets, pass canteens and let the exhaustion of the day roll out of their limbs. Friends trade snacks, and there's a light hum of conversation.

There must be some murmur among the three sailors about Merry's girlfriend now being available back in Jamestown, because McBride suddenly growls, "If any of my men make a move on Kaitlyn when we get back home, it's going to be two weeks of swabbing and latrine duty. Give it a month at least, for Christsake, boys."

The sailors fall silent and concentrate on eating.

Daryl swallows down the last of his food. "Gonna check the prize counter," he says as he drags himself to his feet. "Sometimes they got candy."

"No candy's going to be good after all these years," Carol assures him.

"We'll see."

McBride has unzipped Merry's pack. He digs around and pulls out a bag of Jamestown coffee beans. "Give these to the mother of Merry's baby. I hear they fetch a lot in trade at Oceanside." He hands them to Cyndie, who slides them into her own pack. "Lincoln," McBride asks, "what size shirt do you wear?"

"Large."

McBride tosses Merry's shirt in the sailor's direction, and Seaman Lincoln catches it. "That's yours," McBride tells him. "Also, you're an Ensign now. Congratulations."

"Thank you, Captain! Sir!"

"Thank Merry."

Seaman Lincoln's face falls.

"Reedus," McBride says. "Knickers?"

"Merry's?" Seaman Reedus asks. "Think I'll pass. Take his socks though."

McBride tosses Merry's rolled up socks to Seaman Reedus, who fails to catch them. Jerry flicks them with a finger and rolls them back his way. Next, McBride tosses Merry's canvass pants to Ensign Morgan.

"Those'll be floods on him!" Reedus complains.

"Look who's talking," Morgan shoots back.

"You're right. You're both short. Give Alvarado the pants," McBride insists. "Morgan, you can have Merry's spare knife."

"This seems a little off the books," Gunther notes. "Is there no will on file with the courthouse?"

Jesus, who is lounging next to Tara, raises an eyebrow. "You have a _courthouse_?"

"There _is_ a will on file," McBride says. "I'm the executor, and the distribution is at my whim. That's how most of my boys do it unless they get married. They don't have any other family." McBride pulls out a hand carved wooden necklace next. "I suppose he bought this for Kaitlyn."

"I'll give it to her for him!" Seaman Reedus volunteers.

" _I'll_ give it to her," McBride insists. "I don't trust your motives."

"My motives are pure, Captain."

"Whoever gives it to her is going to have to deliver the news."

"Oh. Yeah," Reedus murmurs. "That should probably be you then."

McBride unhooks Merry's spare cutlass from the pack and lays it aside.

"Who gets that?" Seaman Reedus asks.

"I'm saving it for Seaman Bernthal, back home. She doesn't have one yet."

"She doesn't have a boyfriend yet, either," Reedus observes.

"Not for lack of trying on your part I'm sure," McBride tells him. "And please bear in mind she's seventeen."

"She's nineteen. And I'm twenty-nine. That's less than half plus seven."

"Actually, it's not," Eugene tells him. "Half plus seven would be 21.5, precisely. 22 if we're generously rounding."

Rosita, who sits beside him, chuckles.

"It sounds like you need a math refresher, sailor," McBride tells Reedus.

"Well you _were_ dating _her_." Reedus points to Cyndie. "And you're more than half plus seven her."

"Negatory on that one as well," Eugene says. "The captain earlier pinpointed his age at thirty-seven years, which would give him a range of 25.5 to 60, and Cyndie has pinpointed her age at precisely twenty-six, give or take a few months in either direction."

Michonne chuckles. "I can't _wait_ to date a thirty-seven-year old when _I'm_ sixty."

Lt. Alvarado glowers, and she pats his cheek playfully.

"What's all this half plus seven stuff?" Henry asks Carol.

Carol screws on the lid of her canteen. "Don't worry about it. I'm just glad you married someone your own age." Her voice a little lower, so it's just between her and him, she asks, "That's going well, right?"

Henry shrugs.

Carol doesn't like the shrug. "What's that about?"

"Nothing. It's just," Henry's half whispering. "She started getting weirdly jealous of Lydia for a while. And Rachel's the one who _made_ me make friends with her in that guardhouse in the first place."

Carol briefly wonders if Cyndie wanted the Hilltop to take Lydia not just because her people killed one of Oceanside's, but to get her away from Henry and remove a potential obstacle to an Oceanside marriage. She wouldn't put that kind of thoughtful maneuvering past the woman. Cyndie's always looking out for her people, in her own way. "You and Rachel worked it out though?"

"I think so. I mean, I'm not that _guy_ , you know. Who would ever…you know."

"I know you're not," Carol assures him. "I just hope Rachel knows."

McBride pulls a small mason jar of white liquid out of Merry's backpack. He unscrews the cap and sniffs. "Candy shine."

"I think Merry deserves a toast," Seaman Reedus says.

"On that I will agree with you." McBride raises the jar, "to Merry!"

"To Merry!" the Navy men all cry.

McBride sips and leans forward to hand the jar across the way to Reedus, who half crawls over from the other hole to take it. The Navy men pass the jar around until it's gone, with Lieutenant Alvarado giving a final toast to the late ensign's memory.

McBride pulls out a leatherbound book from Merry's pack and turns it in his hands.

"What's that?" Alvarado asks.

"A Bible," McBride says with surprise.

"Huh," Ensign Morgan says. "Merry. Who'd of thought it. He never goes to chapel."

McBride opens it. "It was a family Bible, looks like. Mother. Father. Sisters' names. Dates. It's all here. He kept it. All these years."

"We should put it in the museum," Lt. Alvarado says. "As part of his display in the hall of the fallen."

McBride nods and sets the Bible aside. By the time he's done emptying the rest of the pack, Daryl is back. He slides down shoulder to shoulder with Carol.

"I take it you didn't find anything?" she asks.

"'Member what we found that one time, after we first found Jamestown? On the way back to the Kingdom?"

"You're kidding."

Daryl grins and tilts his partially open backpack toward her to reveal the giant pixie sticks inside, in their colorful plastic straws. "Pure sugar don't spoil."

"Is there something you want to share with the group?" Jesus asks.

"Nah," Daryl insists, jerking up the zipper on his back.

Jesus leans forward slightly where he's sitting cross-legged like a guru. "Doesn't Jamestown have some kind of rule about supply runners sharing their finds?"

Daryl shoots Aaron a look, mouths something that looks to Carol almost like _twat_ , and Aaron nods with a light smile. She wonders what that's all about. "Nah," Daryl tells Jesus. "'S only for 'fficial supply runs. Out on yer own, 'n 's less than fits 'n a backpack, 's finder's keepers."

"That sounds a little greedy," Rosita muses.

"'S just pixie sticks! Gonna give 'em to the kids!"

Dianne actually gasps. "Oh God," she says. "I used to love those when I was kid."

"Daryl, old friend," Gunther says in a jovial voice, "what would I have to pay you to get my beautiful bride-to-be just one solitary pixie stick?"

Daryl sighs, jerks the zipper back down, mutters, "Fine! Buy me a drink back at Jamestown" and tosses a giant pink and white plastic straw in Gunther's direction. He catches it one handed. "That's huge!" Gunther exclaims. "I thought you meant one of those little paper ones."

"I'll share it with you," Dianne assures him.

"Rest is for the kids!" Daryl growls.

"Hey," Henry says with a smile. "We're in a miniature golf course. Maybe we could _all_ be kids tonight." When Daryl glowers, he continues. "I'm not asking for a pixie stick. I just mean…does anyone want to play?"

There are sighs and eye rolls and muttering about exhaustion, and Carol feels bad for her son, because his face is one big smile, like the little kid it seems he was just a few short years ago. She's almost ready to volunteer herself as tribute, even though her every muscle is sore, and she was looking forward to sinking into sleep, when Jerry grins broadly. "I'll play!" Of course she should know she could count on Jerry.

"Ah, hell, I'm in!" Seaman Reedus exclaims. "If I can get one of you lovely Oceanside ladies to play with me?"

"You got a problem with Hilltop ladies?" the former Kingdom archer who now lives at the Hilltop asks. She's got to be almost fifteen years older than Seaman Reedus, but that doesn't dampen his enthusiasm any.

"No, ma'am! Would you like to play with me?"

She laughs. "I'll play one round."

"I'm in," Gunther says. "I have fond memories of playing with my own boys, every summer at Virginia Beach. It was our one annual vacation." He glances at Dianne. "Are you game?"

"Now that I've my magic pixie stick?" She shoots back some sugar, swallows, and says, "You bet I am."

Gunther smiles affectionately, stands, and reaches his hand down to her to help her up.

"I'd play," Aaron tells Mitch. "But I'd hate to beat you with one hand tied behind my back. It could be embarrassing."

Mitch scrambles to his feet. "Oh, you're on!"

No one else seems eager to join, and they sit slumped and lounging as the others head toward the counter where the dusty clubs lie.

"Guess we're going to have to clear off these holes," Michonne says.

They grab their things and find an open, carpeted area off the golf course where they lay out their bed rolls. Cyndie volunteers to take first watch for the night, since she was the one who dragged them into all this, and heads toward the front entrance with her harpoon.

Everyone who's not playing begins to settle into sleep. Daryl and Carol lay on top of his spread-out bed roll and drape hers over themselves for a layer of warmth. Getting out of those wet clothes warmed them for a while, but now the November night chill is becoming more obvious. She rolls on her side and rests a head on the hard pillow of his shoulder. From here she can make out the shadowy outlines of the people playing at holes one and two and hear their drifting laughter and bits of their conversation. She sees Aaron trying to correct Mitch's swing one handed, and Mitch playfully threating to club him with the club.

"I don't know why I didn't think of that possibility," she murmurs.

"What?" Daryl replies sleepily.

"Mitch and Aaron."

"Ah. Yeah. They were drinkin' together last night."

"Is that why you came back earlier than I expected?"

"Mhmhm."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell ya what?" He settles his fingertips at the little bit of her otherwise short hair that curls down her neck and toys with the stands.

"You're terrible at gossip."

Henry laughs as a glowing orange ball beams the foot of a big wooden cowboy boot, bounces off, and rolls out of the zone and all the way to the wall of the building. Carol smiles and closes her eyes.

"Hell's the theme?" Daryl asks.

"What?" she opens one eye.

"Spaceships. Windmills. Cowboy boots. Glowin' rocks. Water well. Hell's the theme of this place?"

"Maybe it's the apocalypse," she says, and snorts at her own joke.

Daryl chuckles and gives her a one-arm squeeze. "Yer terrible at jokes."

"You laughed."

"Laughin' _at_ you. Not _with_ you."

"You'd _never_ laugh at me."

He kisses the top of her head and whispers, "Love ya, Mrs. Dixon."

"I love you, too." Now she closes her eyes all the way, and soon they both fall asleep to the rhythm of clacking balls and the intermittent, gentle snores that have begun to surround them.


	213. Chapter 213

The roadway has narrowed to a single lane on each side. Most of the leaves still hold onto the trees in the woods that line the street, clinging to branches and waving in the November breeze like red, gold, and orange flags. The storm passed sometime in the night, and the sun shines down on the soaked black asphalt, sending occasional blinding glints of light off the puddles in potholes. Carol peers into the half open window of a car as the group walks by. A lone walker gnashes inside, so famished it has, after all these years, wasted away to almost bones. She doesn't bother with it.

A few steps behind her, Lt. Alvarado jimmies open the trunk and roots around. Carol turns back to see what he finds, and Daryl stills beside her. The navy man comes up with a blue first aid kit. He flings it open, picks out the contents worth keeping, and shoves them into the outer pocket of his pack. Meanwhile, Michonne pulls from the trunk a gallon-sized, plastic ziplock bag. "Girl's," she tells Carol. "Clean and sealed. Toddler size. You want them for Sweetheart?"

Carol catches the bag Michonne tosses to her. It's labeled _Emergency Change of Clothes_ in fading, black permanent marker. She used to do the same thing for Sophia, right down to the gallon bag. The underwear, socks, shirt, and shorts inside look to be in decent condition, sealed away from dust and moths. "Thanks."

Daryl meanwhile has strolled back to the trunk. He pulls a slightly deflated football out of it and turns it in his hands. Then he swivels, shuffles three steps from the trunk, and shouts, "Heads up!" before tossing it toward the tail end of the hiking pack, where a surprised Henry tries to catch it, fumbles, and then plucks it up again from the ground. Henry tosses it back to Daryl, but undershoots, and Gunther runs forward from somewhere in the hiking pack to intercept it.

"Good catch," Dianne tells him as she strolls over to the car.

"I was the quarterback for my high school football team." Gunther leans back against the side of the trunk like a flirting high school boy, tosses the ball in the air, and catches it with one hand. "1987 Virginia State Champions."

"Really?" A smile barely teases the corner of Dianne's lips. "Do you still have the ring?"

"Well, I wasn't on the team in 1987," Gunther says.

Dianne snorts.

Daryl and Carol rejoin the hiking pack.

"That was after I dropped out of school to help save the family farm," Gunther says as he and Dianne fall back into the hike behind them.

"I was a cheerleader," Dianne tells him.

Upon hearing this, Carol glances at Daryl. He clearly shares her skepticism about this claim, and they try not to laugh as their eyes catch.

Gunther is no less skeptical. "Like hell you were." He turns and tosses the football back to Henry. The teenager has to run backward and jump up to catch it, but he succeeds this time, and Jerry claps.

"Believe it or not, I really was," Dianne insists.

"Is that so?" Gunther asks. "Do you still have the uniform?"

"You _wish_."

The murmur of their conversation fades as Carol and Daryl pull further ahead, keeping pace with Michonne and Lieutenant Alvarado toward the front of the pack, a couple yards behind Captain McBride, who is flanked by a sailor on his left and two on his right.

"Judith and RJ are going to _love_ those pixie sticks," Michonne tells Carol. "Daryl's going to be like Santa Claus rolling into Oceanside with those. I can't believe I never used to let Andre have sweets. I guess the apocalypse loosened me up."

"Andre?" Lieutenant Alvarado asks from beside her.

Michonne purses her lips as if she didn't mean to let the name or the memory slip out. "From before," she says solemnly. "He was three."

"Oh."

"It's like another world now," Michonne says. "When I was another person. But a mother never forgets."

"No, we don't," Carol agrees quietly. For her it wasn't another world, though. It was still this one, because the man who walked the road for her daughter, who was wounded in his search for, _still_ stands at her side. She feels his fingertips now, on the small of her back, light feathers of comfort, for just a moment, and then they're gone.

"My daughter was named Carmela," Lt. Alvarado says. "She was four."

Michonne glances at him in surprise. It's so rare that any of them talk about _the before_ anymore. Her surprise turns to curiosity. "Were you sixteen when you had her?"

He laughs. "How old do you think I am?"

"Thirty," she says. "More or less. That's what I've been assuming."

He laughs again. "All right, well, keep assuming that if you like."

"How old _are_ you?" Michonne asks.

"Not thirty."

"Thirty-five?"

"Not thirty-five."

" _Forty_?" Michonne asks.

"I'm thirty-eight, if you must know."

"There's no way you're thirty-eight. Captain McBride is thirty-seven."

"Promotion isn't based on _age_."

Daryl whirls suddenly in response to Henry's call of _heads up!_ and catches the flying football with a _thunk_. He tosses it back in the direction from which it came and turns to walk forward again.

"Good catch. Were _you_ the quarterback on _your_ high school football team?" Carol asks with a smirk.

"Pffft. Nah. I was cap'n of the marchin' band, of course."

Carol laughs.

"Played the clarinet," Daryl deadpans.

Michonne lets out a low chuckle. "What I wouldn't pay to see you play the clarinet, detective."

"Detective?" Alvarado asks.

"Never mind," Michonne tells him. "It's an inside joke. And a very old one."

"You and Daryl have a lot of inside jokes," he observes.

"Well we used to run around a lot together looking for this asshole who needed killing."

"Did you find him?" Alvarado asks.

She sighs. "He found us. But let's not talk about that. It's such a beautiful day." It's true. The birds are chirping and the sun is shining in the aftermath of last night's storm. The after-scent of rain fills the air around them. "How old have you been assuming _I_ am?"

The lieutenant shakes his head. "I'm not dumb enough to play that game."

Michonne chuckles.

"Think you'll come by on the last mailboat before winter?" Alvarado asks her with a hopeful smile. "To Jamestown?"

"Those slots are always in high demand."

"Have you considered demanding one?" he asks.

"They have to keep one open because Raul's coming to stay at the Hilltop for the winter," Michonne replies. "Then there's the pilot." She ticks the claimed slots off on her fingers. "They'll reserve a slot in case Mallory decides to come back to Oceanside instead of staying with…." She trails off and nods to Captain McBride's back. "So that leaves only three slots."

"And you're slender enough to fit in half of one," Alvarado says. "I fail to see the problem."

"Like I said, those slots are in high demand. Henry might want to come see his mother. And there are a few Jamestown sailors with Oceanside girlfriends, too, I understand."

Captain McBride turns around to face Michonne and walks backward as he talks. "I don't think Mallory will need that slot back to Oceanside. I think she'll like Jamestown and me just fine. She'll have an entire mess hall for her private kitchen on the _Susan Constant_. And she can have the second officer's cabin as her sitting room." He turns forward again.

"What about Witherspoon?" Ensign Lincoln asks.

"Oh, he'll move into Devon's room at the dorms soon enough," McBride answers.

"I wish I could swing that way!" Seaman Reedus exclaims. "Think of all the action!"

"With the only other two or three gay men in all of Jamestown?" Lincoln asks.

"I meant if we _all_ swang that way."

"Well I can be flexible, pretty boy." Lincoln reaches over and slaps the seaman's ass. Reedus yelps in surprised disgust, stumble-leaps forward a few paces, and looks back at Ensign Lincoln suspiciously. Captain McBride lets out a boom of a laugh. It draws a walker from the edge of the woods, which Dianne pauses to shoot. She peels off from the pack to recover her spent arrow.

Carol notices that Daryl has dropped back to talk with Mitch and Aaron. She leaves him to his guy talk and remains by Michonne's side.

"Did you hear the junior lieutenant's moving off the _Godspeed_?" Ensign Morgan asks. "He was just waiting for Cassidy to turn eighteen, I guess. He's marrying her and moving in with her and her mother in that little hut."

"God, I'd hate to have to live with my mother-in-law," Seaman Reedus mutters.

"Well, you'd need a wife for that first, wouldn't you?" Lincoln asks him. "I don't think you're any danger of that."

Reedus flicks him off. "Just you watch. I'll find me a damsel in distress one of these days."

"I think all the former damsels in distress are dead by now," Lincoln says. "Or well-trained enough to kick your scrawny ass."

"I'd like to see _your_ scrawny ass try."

"Boys," Captain McBride scolds. "Enough now."

Michonne glances at Alvarado. "It sounds like you play a lot of musical houses at Jamestown."

"Marrying and begetting," Lieutenant Alvarado tells her. "It's how we sustain civilization, isn't it?"

"Mhm," Michonne says noncommittally. "Well I've begat once already since the world ended. And so did my husband, and now she's mine, too."

"Your…husband?" Alvarado asks.

"My _late_ husband, I meant."

"Quite the formidable ghost, Rick Grimes." Lt. Alvarado raises his voice slightly: "Captain, I'm going to veer off to refill my canteen. I'll catch up with the group later." He leaves the pack and jogs toward the woods. McBride glances in his direction and carries on.

McBride and the sailors move forward a few paces. When it's just Michonne and Carol side by side, with a lane of privacy, Carol turns to her with a raised eyebrow.

"What?" Michonne asks.

"You could be nicer to the lieutenant. He's obviously smitten with you."

"I've been _honest_ with him. I'm not looking for a commitment. I told him that from day _one_. He said he was fine with that."

"He's clearly _not_ fine with it."

Michonne sighs. She glances toward McBride's back up ahead. "These Navy boys. Who would have thought they'd be more interested in getting married than having a good time?"

Carol hears Daryl's dry laugh and glances back toward him. Aaron is showing him how he can switch out the weapons he attaches to his stump, and Mitch has apparently just said something funny. "Do you like him?" Carol asks as she turns forward again. "Lieutenant Alvarado?"

"What's not to like?" Michonne replies. "But no one will ever replace Rick. He needs to know that. It wouldn't be fair to him to pretend I can give him more than I can."

"It's been years," Carol says.

"If anything ever happened to Daryl, do you think you'd fall in love with another man again?"

Carol doubts she would even have a casual fling. But what happened between Rick and Michonne happened so fast, out of seeming nowhere, at least from Carol's distant witness point. Not that Rick didn't love Michonne. Not that he wouldn't have died for her. He _did_ die for her. For _all_ of them. But after Lori, after Jesse…sometimes Carol thinks it could have been any random woman from Alexandria or Oceanside or the Hilltop instead of Michonne, and Rick would have been just as loyal and sacrificial. Rick _needed_ someone. Anyone. And while he was alive, it seemed to Carol that he overshadowed Michonne. Since his death, Michonne's emerged from that shadow. She's her own woman again - leader of Alexandria, slayer of walkers, follower of no one.

But maybe Carol's perspective is narrowed by her own relationship with Rick, Carol thinks. She and Rick never really saw eye to eye. Even though she forgave him his banishment of her, that wound never fully closed. Not _fully_. And even from the start, she had thought Daryl would make a better leader, if he would just step up and assert himself. But Daryl was so used to living under Merle's shadow. He wasn't comfortable in his own light, not then.

Daryl doesn't live in anyone's shadow anymore, but he's also not interested in being a mayor or a councilman or a sheriff. He's interested in roaming the forest, feeding people with wild game, fighting whatever battle needs to be fought, and then coming home from it all to watch Sweetheart laugh and feed her pet lizard, tuck his daughter into bed, and make love to his wife. It's probably the life he's always secretly wanted – the quiet life, where he has a clear and meaningful role to play – where there's a fire in the hearth, no fists being thrown beneath the roof, no dishes smashing against cabin walls – just the ordinary. The mundane. The quietly beautiful. It's a life he never thought he deserved, a life that took him a long while to settle into. But he _has_ settled into it.

Carol looks back and smiles at Daryl as he laughs now. He ducks Aaron's mock blow and shuffles like a boxer, putting his arms up before his face.

"Would you?" Michonne repeats.

"No," Carol replies. She glances back again. The whole hiking pack is a abuzz with smiles and conversation. Cyndie's joking with Jerry while Dianne teases Gunther and Jesus is showing Henry some martial arts move. The navy men are hurling playful verbal barbs at each other while Tara laughs with an Oceanside guard. It feels like one big extended family come together for a reunion after too many years apart.

But the laughter and hum of a dozen different dialogues is shattered by the sound of Lt. Alvarado's pounding footsteps as he flies out of the woods and back onto the roadway toward them, his canteen jangling at his side. They all stop and turn. He comes to a rest before Cyndie, bends over, panting, and then stands, catches his breath, and speaks. "I saw signs of a temporary camp back there in the woods, across the creek. I didn't cross over, but…I think I may have found them. The last two of those Skins Oceanside didn't kill."

Cyndie grips her harpoon. "Show me."


	214. Chapter 214

Carol, Daryl, Michonne, Captain McBride, Mitch, and Dianne volunteer to join Lt. Alvarado and Cyndie in scouting out the campsite he spied from a distance.

"I want to come, too," Henry insists.

Carol shakes her head. "Eight's plenty. Any more than that, and they'll be sure to hear us coming."

The scouting party sheds their packs to lighten their loads and leaves them on the road with the rest of the group.

"Fire a signal shot if you need us," Aaron tells Mitch, "and we'll come running."

"Be careful out there," Gunther tells Dianne, and then he offers his last three rounds of ammunition to Captain McBride.

"Keep them," McBride insists. "In case you need firepower out here on the road. I have four rounds still. Mitch has five."

Lt. Alvarado leads the way into the woods and over flat stones in the creek, though some don't bother to keep their feet dry. Daryl splashes through the water, eyes scouring both shores for any sign.

"Be careful," Cyndie warns in a low voice. "If we encounter a pack of walkers, the Skins might be among them. When you go in to kill, watch their hands."

They scale the opposite bank and creep toward the two-tent camp site Alvarado spied earlier from the opposite shore. Two lines of barbwire, strung from tree to tree, encase the seemingly empty campsite. Captain McBride pulls a pair of wire cutters from his belt and snaps the three layers. 

Carol carefully rolls a few strands back, and Daryl, crossbow poised, creeps inside. He pauses to squat by a stone circle with the ashes of a fire. He puts a hand over the burnt remnants of twigs and branches to feel for heat. Then he stands and inches toward the first tent.

He waits in front of it, crossbow aimed, for Carol to yank back the flap. There's no one inside, but there are three bedrolls. Three. In _one_ tent. This is not a camp for two. Daryl locks eyes with Carol. Carol holds up three fingers to Cyndie, whose hands tighten around her harpoon. Mitch, who has his loaded rifle ready turns and scours the tree line, where red and orange leaves cling as if by threads to the branches.

Daryl and Carol inch toward the second tent. Carol's fingers curl around the flap and Daryl inches one foot forward, pressing his body into his bow, as she rips back the flap. _Nothing_.

Daryl lowers his bow. "Two are livin' in there," he says, nodding to the tent. "Three in the other tent. Fire was lit just last night." He points beyond the tents. "Tracks goin' off that way. They went somewhere. Looking for supplies, maybe."

"My guard says there were only two Skins who got away," Cyndie says. "And you're telling me there were _five_ people in this camp?"

"There could be more Skins you don't know about," McBride suggests. "More than the seven who were in the camp Lydia took you to, who were out and about when you got there."

"But I don't see any masks or skin suits around here, do you?" Michonne asks.

"No," McBride admits.

Daryl suddenly raises his bow with two hands. Carol doesn't know what he hears, but she follows his lead and strings an arrow into her bow. Mitch levels his rifle.

Eyes flit from tree to tree. Both Mitch and Daryl turn suddenly in the same direction – their hunters' ears tuned toward prey. Abruptly, Mitch lets out a loud cry. He drops his rifle, tumbles to the ground, rolls on his back, and clutches his knee.

Daryl shoots, but his crossbow jerks up as he does so, and the arrow lodges into the thick bark of a tree. He drops his bow and, screaming in pain, falls to the ground to coddle his knee. There's a loud thunk, and suddenly Cyndie, howling, is also on the ground. McBride runs to her aid and bends himself over her as if to take for her whatever shot might come next.

Dianne and Carol stand back to back with bows drawn and arrows ready to fly, circling around to find their attackers. Alvarado rasps out his saber at the same time Michonne draws her katana. They, too, stand back to back.

Carol glances down at Daryl. What was he hit with? There's no arrow or throwing star sticking out from him. There was no sound of a gunshot, and there's not even any blood seeping through his fingers where he clutches his knee, but he's clearly in immense pain.

There's another loud _whap,_ and Alvarado too screams, topples, and grabs his knee.

Dianne and Carol, still back to back, let loose two blind arrows in the general direction of the shots. Just as they're drawing from their quivers to reload, four women sweep into the camp. One, a black woman with curly hair, kicks Daryl's fallen crossbow aside and then stomps down on his hand when he reaches for it. She aims a loaded sling shot at his head, and he stills.

A second, younger black woman aims a sling shot at Michonne. A white woman with brown, scraggly hair seizes Mitch's rifle from the ground and points it at McBride and Cyndie as McBride rises from the ground and attempts to unshoulder his rifle. A fourth woman grinds her boot heel down on Alvarado's hand as it closes around his saber on the ground. She holds a longbow with an arrow drawn and pointed at Carol and Dianne. "Drop it!" she yells. "All of you! Drop your weapons or we'll all shoot!"

The whole thing takes less than sixty seconds, from the time Mitch first fell and clutched his knee to the time the bow woman is yelling, "Drop it _now_!"

Dianne and Carol fling their hands up. Their bows topple to the ground. McBride lets his rifle slide from his shoulder to the earth. Michonne growls but drops her katana. There will be time to fight later, but only if they're alive.

Carol looks down at the earth again and sees it this time – the round, black rock that sent the sudden, searing pain through Daryl's knee. It wasn't big enough to bust his knee cap. It's just going to hurt for a long while. They must not have been trying to _kill_ them, or surely that woman would have used her arrows.

The woman with the bow, who is Asian and has long black hair, nods to the younger black woman and tells her to collect the weapons. The young woman pockets her sling shot and scurries about, grabbing the bows and swords and McBride's rifle, all of which she deposits inside one of the tents.

When the woman with the slingshot pointed at Daryl backs off of him, removing her boot from his wrist, he rolls over, sits up, and coddles his hand. Mitch is also sitting up now, with his leg outstretched, wincing. He picks up the black rock with which he was struck, tosses it into the air, and catches it.

"Bloody genius!" McBride says. "You get your ammunition from the earth. You have an unlimited supply. With a good aim, you can bring a man down and disarm him. I wager a bigger rock would go straight through a cannibal's squishy skull, huh?" He looks at the curly haired black woman, but she doesn't reply. She stands with slingshot still drawn. He turns his attention to the Asian bowman. "What do you want with us?"

But it's the white woman with Mitch's rifle who replies. "You're in _our_ camp. So I think _we_ should be the ones asking that question. Are you with those whispering skin freaks?"

"Nah," Daryl insists. "We were lookin' for 'em."

"They killed one of ours," Cyndie explains.

The Asian woman lowers her bow. Her voice cracks as she speaks. "They killed one of ours, too."

There's a sudden burst of movement. Daryl, powering through the lingering pain in his knee, leaps up, draws the knife they didn't bother to disarm him of, and puts it at the neck of the bowwoman. McBride snaps Mitch's rifle from the white woman's hands and turns it on her. Carol moves like a cat in the confusion, draws, and puts her blade at the neck of the curly haired woman with the slingshot. The woman doesn't make a sound. She just silently lowers her sling shot and stays still. The rest burst into the tent to recover their weapons and flank the others.

"Smart enough to get the drop on us," McBride says, "but not smart enough to keep it. Your turn to drop your weapons."

[*]

When the four women are disarmed, and each member of the scouting party has his or her own familiar weapon in hand again, they get names and stories.

The two African-American women who took them down with rocks from sling shots like the lowly shepherd boy David are named Connie and Kelly. Connie is deaf and doesn't talk, but her sister Kelly translates for her. The bowwoman is Yukimo, and the white woman is Magna. They had a man with them, by the name of Luke, but when they ran into a small pack of walkers yesterday, and they thought they would quickly slay them, he was unexpectedly stabbed. He lost too much blood and died this morning. They were burying his body in the woods when Alvarado spied their empty camp.

To reassure the scouting pack that they're telling the truth, the women lead them into the woods to show them the grave and, farther back, the slaughtered walkers. "Once the pack was slain," Yukimo says, "we found two human people among them." She points toward one. "They were wearing these…" She breathes in unsteadily.

"- Skin masks," Magna finishes for her. "They were _in_ the pack. I don't know why."

"Maybe they were trying to rebuild their herd," Cyndie murmurs.

"Their _herd_?" Kelly asks.

Cyndie explains their encounter with the Skins and the herd they recently destroyed.

Yukimo looks stunned. "That many? And they were so close to our camp!"

Connie signs something to her sister, who translates, "She says thank you for clearing them out. We'll have a chance to survive here now."

"You aren't staying _here_ ," Lt. Alvarado insists. "You're coming with us." He looks around at the others. "Aren't they?"

Cyndie looks somewhat reluctant, but agrees, "We can't leave them out here alone. The representatives of the four communities will have to meet and discuss which one of us takes them in."

A stunned look crosses Yukimo's face. She and Magna exchange a glance. Kelly holds up four fingers to her sister and then signs something. Connie's eyes widen.

"You have _four_ communities?" Yukimo asks.


	215. Chapter 215

As they finish the last mile of the trek back to Oceanside, several of the scouting party limping its way because of the lingering pain in their stone-struck knees, Daryl rubs the wrist Connie stamped down on. Connie signs something to Kelly, who tells him, "My sister says she's sorry for kneecapping you."

Daryl grunts.

"We didn't know if you were with those skin freaks," Kelly says. "We thought…better safe than sorry."

Daryl glances across Kelly to Connie. "Yeah, well, tell her I ain't got no hard feelings." He _says_ no hard feelings, but the scowl, Carol notices, has not yet fully left his face.

Lt. Alvarado seems to have no hard feelings, however. For ten minutes, he walked alongside Connie and seemed engaged in a friendly sign language conversation as they hiked. Now he leaves Connie's side and limps back beside Michonne, who is walking just ahead of Daryl and Carol.

"I didn't know you knew sign language," says Michonne, glancing back at Connie.

"That daughter I told you about?" Lt. Alvardo says. "Carmela? She was deaf."

"Teach me?" Daryl asks.

Lt. Alvarado glances back at him. "Sign language?"

"Mhmhm."

"Why? Just so you can talk with Connie? I mean, she's pretty, but you're pretty married."

Daryl glowers. "M'godson's deaf in one ear. Might go deaf in the other one day."

Alvarado looks forward again. "Oh, VanDaryl. Of course, sure, I'd be happy to."

"Me too," Carol says. "And Garland and Shannon. Maybe you could hold a class for us. Even if VanDaryl doesn't go deaf, it wouldn't be bad to know." It could be a good way to communicate when creeping up on walkers, Carol thinks, or at a time of war.

"Buy me a drink for my troubles?" the lieutenant asks. "One drink per one-hour session?"

"I suppose we could," Carol agrees.

"You think she's pretty?" Michonne asks now that the lieutenant has turned fully forward again.

"It's merely an observation of fact."

"There are no _facts_ when it comes to physical attraction."

"You sound almost _bothered_ ," says Lt. Alvarado, with a hint of amusement in his voice.

"Not at all," Michonne insists. "You're free to pursue any woman you like. Just be honest with me if you ever find a serious girlfriend. I don't screw around with other women's men."

Carol slows her pace, so she can stay with Daryl, who is limping more than Alvarado, perhaps because the lieutenant is younger and more flexible, or perhaps because Kelly had poorer aim than Connie and hit Alvarado in a less vulnerable spot. "How you feeling?" she asks.

Daryl grunts and glances at Connie, who is now ahead of them. They've ended up in a line of their own. "A goddamn slingshot," he mutters. "A kid's toy. Shouldn't hurt so damn much."

Carol smiles. "I think your pride's more wounded than your knee."

They walk silently beside one another for a while. Because of their slowed pace, Captain McBride and a limping Cyndie have drawn closer from the row behind them. Carol can overhear their conversation.

"Why did you throw yourself over me like that?" Cyndie asks.

"Because I thought whoever was firing might fire again," McBride answers. "I thought someone was shooting a gun."

"But why would you try to take a bullet for me?"

"Why wouldn't I?" he asks.

"We broke up."

"What do you imagine goes through my mind, Cyndie? Dear God, man, if you aren't getting a blowjob out of it, don't take a bullet for her? Just because we've broken up doesn't mean we aren't allies."

"It's just…I didn't see you throwing yourself over Mitch. Or Daryl. And both of them went down before I did. And both of them are more than just allies. They're your Jamestown people."

The captain sighs. "What do you want me to say? You want me to admit I still care for you? Of _course_ I do. But that's neither here nor there, is it? Because you aren't interested in seeing me more than six to seven times a year."

"Do you think it's fair to Mallory," Cyndie asks quietly, "to ask her to move to Jamestown with you if you still have feelings for me?"

"I didn't ask her to _move_. I asked her to come for a month and give it a whirl. She may or may not decide to stay. You know what? You sound like a child who wants to have her cake and eat it too. Maybe Mallory and I won't have some passionate romance. But maybe we'll make adequate companions to one another. And maybe, in this world, that's about as much as most men can hope for." Captain McBride marches forward, walks around Daryl, and moves somewhere to the front of the pack, leaving a limping Cyndie behind. He falls in place beside Seaman Reedus and Ensign Lincoln, and soon there's joshing and laughter coming from their line.

Henry catches up somewhere from the back of the pack and falls into place on the other side of Carol. "Are you coming on the first spring speed boat?" he asks. "To see the baby?"

"Of course I am. I just wish I could be here when it's born. Are you going to have help?"

"Are you kidding? That kid will have a gaggle of aunties." He puts an arm around her – he's taller than her – and hugs her to his side. "But only one grandmother."

When Henry drops his arm, she says, "I'm still not ready to be called that just yet."

"All right, Granny."

[*]

Sweetheart acknowledges her parents when they return, with a mere glance, and then immediately toddles after the gaggle of kids – including Jerry's – she's been playing with. "Didn't even run to me," Daryl mutters jealously.

Carol pats the small of his back. "She's having fun, Pookie. You're still the apple of her eye, though."

Daryl trails sullenly after his little girl.

[*]

The representatives of the four communities have assemble at Henry's pub to discuss the refugees. "Hilltop's taking in Lydia," Tara insists. "And we barely have resources for her, especially with Raul around a third of the year now. We're not taking these refugees in."

"Alexandria's got Candy now," Michonne says.

"And we've had some migration from Oceanside," Rosita adds. "I don't think this should fall to us, either."

"Jamestown doesn't need anymore people," Carolyn insists. "We're already taking in Dianne." Gunther smiles across the table at his bride-to-be. "And also maybe Mallory?" Carolyn looks across the table at the captain.

"For at least a month," McBride agrees. "Maybe permanently."

"Dianne and Mallory are going to be shacking up with you boys, though," says Michonne, looking from Gunther to McBride. "So it's not as if you'll need extra housing for them."

"We do have Merry's room free now in the dorms," says McBride, and then grits his teeth and looks off in a corner of the pub.

"And my old room," Gunther adds. "Since I moved into Ernesto's old cabin. I suppose the two sisters could stay in one room."

"And the lesbian couple in the other," Tara suggests.

"Those other two are a couple?" Carolyn asks.

"Clearly, although I'm not sure how much longer they'll be together," Tara replies. "Things seemed a little tense between them."

"I think they'll be happy for any room with a roof," Carol suggests. "They've been living in tents. But we need a unanimous vote of all five council members present here before we can come back to Jamestown with refugees."

"Why doesn't Oceanside take them?" Dianne asks. "My cabin will be free now."

"I was going to move that couple who just had the baby out of that crowded boat house," Cyndie replies. "And give them your cabin. And we're probably going to have some migration from Alexandria. It looks like there's been two engagements. And we don't have any farmlands. Just the gardens."

"Do these women have any skills Jamestown needs?" Linda asks.

"Well," Gunther says with a smirk, "I hear Connie can take down the hero of the mutiny of 7 NE with a sling shot. So I imagine she'll make a good guard, supply runner, or deputy."

"They sure would help with the gender imbalance," McBride observes. "Even if two are lesbians, four more women might be a civilizing influence on my men."

"I should hope _you'd_ be a civilizing influence on your men, Captain," Linda says with a sly smile.

"I do try."

As a deputy and a councilmember, it fell to Carol to interview the refugees for Jamestown. Michonne, Cyndie, and Aaron also participated as members of their respective communities. She opens her notebook now. "Yukimo was a defense attorney. We've already got one of those, but Jim would also make a fair judge, and Annette has mentioned felling a bit overwhelmed by the court load, especially now that she's having to train an apprentice. I suppose we could, after she's a citizen and acquainted herself with our laws, make Yukimo an attorney and Jim and Annette co-judges."

"Magna could farm," Gunther says. "She looks strong."

"You don't even _know_ if she can farm!" Linda exclaims.

"Anyone can farm," Gunther says, "with my good instruction and an able body."

"You always want all the workers for yourself," Linda says. "Maybe Magna was a home brewer in the old world and should work in the brew house and distillery. You don't know. What was she, Carol?"

"What she was vague," Carol replies. "And I gather from the prison tattoo she spent some time behind bars in the old world. But I wouldn't necessarily hold that against her. There are lot of pasts best left in the past. She's clearly the leader of her group, so she's kept people alive. I'm sure Gunther could teach her to farm. She's apparently good with a machete already."

"See, she could whack bushes for me," Gunther tells Linda.

"Connie's was a journalist in the old world," Carol continues.

"Jamestown doesn't have a newspaper and doesn't need one," Carolyn insists.

"I don't know," Gunther quips. "Some of our people would truly love a gossip column."

"Does she know shorthand?" Linda asks. "We're going to need a new court reporter eventually. Marjorie is getting on in years. Arthritis is starting to set in."

"She's deaf," Aaron reminds her.

"Oh, yes, I'd forgotten. I guess taking dictation would be a challenge."

"She was a soldier for her old camp," Carol continues. "It was called the Coalition, but it was overrun, and only the five of them got out together. Now four."

"I bet she has heightened eyesight," McBride suggests. "They say when one sense is weaker, the others get stronger. Between that and the shooting skills…I wager she'd make a good guard. What about Kelly?"

"She was just a high school student before it all started," Carol says. "But she was a lookout and guard for her old community. We could rotate Kelly and Connie in the lighthouse. It's been going unmanned for a few hours here and there." It's also a terribly boring job assignment, which means the women would be paying their dues.

After some further discussion, Jamestown votes by a show of hands to take the four women into their community. Sheriff Earl will have to interview them again, and then present his own recommendations to the full council, which will make the final vote. But for now, it's decided they'll sail back to Jamestown and likely find a home there.

The speedboat returns from Jamestown that afternoon, and everyone says their reluctant goodbyes to old friends before boarding the _Susan Constant_. Sweetheart, turning back to look at Judith and RJ and Jerry's kids and her other new friends waving goodbye on the shore, cries, "No! No! No!" when Daryl plucks her up and carries her up the ramp.

They're two passengers heavier than when they arrived. They've added Dianne, Mallory, Connie, Kelly, Magna, and Yukimo, but Merry has been buried and will be memorialized at Jamestown. Rosita and Enid have returned to their respective communities, for now, though both will see their men again. And the fisherman Marcus, who sped with the news to Jamestown, has decided to settle for the winter at Oceanside with the woman he spent the last two days courting and who accompanied him on the speedboat run. He returned to Oceanside's docks with all of his earhtly belongings.

As the sails catch the November wind, and the _Susan Constant_ cuts through the murky waters of the James River, and Daryl, with Sweetheart on his hip, slings an arm around her shoulders, Carol thinks how deeply their four worlds are now intertwining and of the future the Alliance is forging together.

 **THE END  
** **of Part IV**


End file.
